Kayak

I finally was able to put my kayak in the water a couple weeks ago.  Oh what a great time it was!  Super busy with work and travel, but I will have stuff to share soon.  I hope to get on the water two or three more times next week as well!

BH

New Turtle Craft!

My holiday wishes came true and I found myself the lucky owner of a new "turtling" (fishing) kayak this year.  I had spoken about my dream boat before, the Jackson Kayak Coosa, and I can't wait to really get this thing out on the water...

It's a decent sized craft, coming in at 11'3" and weighs a bit under 70 lbs.

Getting her unwrapped was a breeze, and I quickly had her outfitted for a trip!

Notice the fishing pole and snake hook fitting nicely.

But now the question became how to store it??  I am not the handiest of fellows, but I recruited my buddy Rob to help figure something out.  Rob recently got a hard top Jeep Wrangler and had rigged a pully system for the hard top in his garage.  Turns out it broke and fell, but he assured me he wouldn't make the same mistake twice.  I figured he had more experience than I, and maybe he learned a thing or two from his earlier transgressions...

A couple stops at Home Depot, Lowes, the neighborhood ACE hardware, (and then Home Depot and Lowes again) and we were in business.  The boat doesn't weigh a ton, but Molly wasn't thrilled about the idea of it hanging over the front of her car, especially with twiddle dee and twiddle dum suspending it.  We opted for the fairly high load bearing pulleys, rope, etc.  We made sure to try and and eliminate any "weak" points in the system.  After buying everything, I am sure it won't fall due to equipment failure.  Now, knot failure is a whole other issue.

Most of our supplies, just after getting started.  

We rocked out to some Black Keys as we fashioned the webbing around craft.  We used heavy duty caribiners to connect the webbing to the rope, with a section of rope to keep the straps tight in the middle.

Here we are getting ready for the first test pull.  We quickly fashion rope loops around the rafters just for the test run, and ended up with heavy duty chains, as eventually trading up for climping rope too.

Good thing we checked first too.  The initial pulleys didn't have a swivel feature, and the "track" for the rope was too shallow.  The rope kept coming off and getting wedged.  New pulleys, new rope, and our chains now in place...

To keep the chains from sliding, we bolted them in place in the beam.

Another test run later, the craft pulled up and down fairly easily, with everything staying smooth.

I read you should hand your kayaks upside down to prevent warping.  We lowered it down, figured out how to tie it off on the wall, and we were in business!

It isn't the prettiest, or easiest tie, but it is redundant and it works.   We used a heavy duty loop and hook initially.  The loop is bolted into the beam, and when you pull the hook and knot down it easily hooks in.  Makes it pretty simple for one person to do.  We could only find a small cleat, and probably should have gotten a bigger dock cleat from a boating supply store. Since this was kinda the backup, we opted to just loop a knot around the cleat we had.  What little excess rope there is is looped above.

And there she is, all hoisted up!

Many thanks to Rob for all of his help!  Now I just need to come up with a creative herping name, and get her in the water!  Spring and the rivers are just around the corner...

Any name suggestions for a river worthy turtle craft??

BH

By the way, we hung her Jan 9th, and if any of you were wondering she hasn't crashed down on Molly's car yet!

The Perfect Turtle Kayak?

As you might have realized by now, I spend much of my free time kayaking and canoeing for turtles in northern Michigan. My goals involve having fun on the rivers, enjoying the outdoors, finding turtles, and photography. Unfortunately, problems occur when "having fun on the rivers and photography" collide.

"insert here picture of me soaking wet, with a flipped boat, holding my camera gear above my head"

Luckily, that picture doesn't exist. Oh it happened twice this season, but no one photographed it.

I had until this point been happy borrowing kayaks from friends, or renting kayaks and canoes from various liveries. I found the smaller kayaks miserable, as my legs constantly cramped up and went numb. I also was constantly toying with disaster, as I found they were relatively easy to flip if one wasn't paying attention. I was lucky in that both times I flipped, all my gear was stowed away in dry bags, but it wasn't hard to imagine my spotting a turtle, pulling out the camera and lenses, focusing on the turtle (not the river) and ending up in the drink...

Turtlers enjoying the paddle

When I was fortunate enough to canoe with a partner, I enjoyed the added stability and often would float with my camera in my lap, ready for the turtles. I wondered if I could find that kind of stability in a kayak...

One of my favorites taken from a canoe

I started looking at sit on tops kayaks as well as fishing kayaks. Sit on tops seemed a bit more stable, but often gave up on storage and maneuverability. I did like that I could just slide off the side of the boat if I decided to go in the drink after a turtle. Fishing kayaks are designed with the fisherman in mind, often with things that would benefit the intrepid turtler. They have ample storage, increased width/stability for the fisherman to stand(!!!) and cast, and often incorporate sit on top models with super comfy seats.

You gotta be able to slide in nicely for em...

 

Luckily, the worlds aligned for me. On my perfect day of turtling, I found the perfect kayak.  I asked the owner of random livery I had chosen to rent my kayak that day if he had any sit on top or fishing kayak models.  He seemed perplexed by my lack of fishing gear, and I explained my true intentions of photographing turtles.  He mentioned he had just received a new boat that he thought would be perfect.  It was love at first sight...

Wouldn't this be nice...

This day was epic for many reasons.  I found a crap load of turtles, and fell in love with a kayak.  I hope to be the proud owner of a Jackson Kayak Coosa for the next season if I am lucky.  It has the leg room, stability, comfy seat, and room to slide in I am looking for.  You can even add a drag chain to "drop anchor" and slow down if I spot a turtle I want to photograph.  This kayak was made for fishing rivers, and I am convinced it is the perfect turtle boat.  I may have only spent one day with it, but I hope to spend many more in the future.  I am sure you will be the first to know if I do.  A true Cinderella story...

Got Wood 2011

As you may have noticed from previous posts, I highly enjoy searching for wood turtles during the warmer months.  I my opinion, there is nothing better than cruising in a nice canoe/kayak down a northern Michigan river.  Each year I try to add another river or two to my list, and hopefully a new wood turtle as well.

I probably won't get out again, but I won't completely close the book on the season yet.  Anyway, this year was extra successful.   I kayaked 5 Michigan rivers this season on all parts of the state.  3 of those were new for me.  One of the repeats was a river I have yet to see a wood turtle on yet, and it is unclear if they are even still there.  I will most likely do this river each year at least once in hope of getting lucky.  The only day I got skunked was on this river, and it did rain all day early in May.

I want to share with you a magical day in mid-July. I was looking into a few rivers to paddle in NW Michigan, near where my wife and I vacation for a few days each summer.  The friend we stay with mentioned he fishes one of them and told me it was by far his favorite river.  I was hooked.  I applied some of my past experiences in deciding how to attack the river, and drew up a game plan.  

Part of that plan was trying out a sit-on-top kayak or a fishing kayak.  I had already flipped a canoe with my dogs this spring, as well as a small kayak randomly and am trying to avoid that as much as possible.  I pulled up to the store around 830-9 am and asked about renting a kayak for the day.  I was informed I was in luck, not only did have have a couple sit-on-top boats, but he had a new one that just came in that he thought we would perfect for me (we can visit the perfect boat subject later).  He also mentioned they see tons of turtles on the river.  Needless to say, I was getting excited.

I was dropped at the put-in site a few minutes later.  I usually explore around a little, but I was too anxious today.  After a short prep with the new boat, I was on the water.  I paddled under the bridge overhang, looked to my left and noticed a wood turtle basking right there.  We were off like a herd of turtles...

Seriously, that easy?

It was about 930am.  I will spare you the intimate details, but basically I spotted 10 turtles in the next 2 hours, and 14 for the 4 hours.  It was unreal.  I would climb in the boat, paddle a little, then see a turtle, turn around, find a way to photograph it, rinse and repeat.  Again.  And again.  It rocked.

And finally, the last of the day, about 20 yards away from the bridge I would get out at.

This day was pretty awesome.  I only saw 1 other turtle, a large snapping turtle.  I can't believe it is always that awesome, but the owner of the shop did say they see tons of turtles...  Have to check it out again next year as well.

So how was the kayak?  Ahh more to come on that later...

BH