Blogging from A to Z – K

Kayaking

For the past few years I’ve been thinking that I would like to be a person who kayaks.  It seemed like a fun lifestyle.  Unfortunately I live too far away from the lake to easily run up there on a day off without making a whole day adventure of it.  

Last year I realized that I was an idiot.

You see I grew up near Lake Erie.  That’s what I think of when I think of a body of water.  Yes, it would take me over an hour to get there now.  But, amazingly (to my brain) there are more bodies of water in the world than the Great Lakes.  In fact, I’m all but surrounded by rivers and lakes.  In the summer every third or fourth car has kayaks on their roofs.  Where did I think they were all going? I live down the street from this guy even.

Last summer I explored the idea a little.  I did a trip down a quiet river in a rental kayak a few times and agreed that I would like to do this on a regular basis.  I started to look for a kayak.

Videos on YouTube told me that the first thing I needed to learn was how to roll my kayak upside down and then right it.  No thank you.  I decided a wanted a sit-on-top kayak so if it flipped over, I would just fall out.  I’ll take my chances swimming with a life vest on.  I watched videos of people running crazy rapids and going over waterfalls.  Nope.  I’m not about that life.  I would like to putter around a lake while taking pictures of birds and plants.  Then I saw a video of people testing the stability of fishing kayaks by standing up on them and walking around and casting fishing rods.  These were my people.  I have no interest in fishing but I have a lot of interest in not flipping over.  

I figured out the beginner fishing kayak I wanted and then started watching to see when it would go on sale through the winter.  I finally found a sale but not on the boat I wanted.  I found the kayak that is the next step up in that brand, on sale, with a paddle included, with free shipping for about $100 less than I was looking to spend on the other kayak.  I jumped on the buy button.

It has been here since the beginning of February waiting for warm weather to go out and start exploring.

One thing I learned in my research – If you are on instagram, follow #kayakingwithdogs for delightful pictures of dogs in their life jackets going out on kayaks.  It is well worth your time.  Sometimes the hashtag gets hijacked by kayakers doing crazy stunts (without dogs because dogs have more sense) which is sad but it let me know what insane things other people do with kayaks.