Any Kayakers Here?

[paddlenbike]

I have a Necky Looksha, a 15' sit-in touring kayak with dry storage front and rear and a foot-operated rudder. I live near a large slow-moving river, so I tend to paddle that more than anything else. I also frequent lakes and a few coastal estuaries here in CA. My favorite thing to do is load up the boat with my camping gear and do overnight trips with friends. I don't do whitewater. My boat is a compromise, it will do light river work, it paddles nice on open water and has plenty of room for overnight gear, but it doesn't excel at any of those things. My next boat will be lighter (kevlar), at least 17' in length to make more room for gear and make it faster in the water and slightly narrower for more efficient paddling. I have a carbon paddle that lowers the effort level down a noticeable amount. I am anxious to do some paddling later this year!

[ecchamberlin]

That is a nice looking sit-in. The Runner is looking really great to.

I am going to have to test out a few more sit-in because the ones I have tried seemed cramped compared to the sit on tops. I really like the Wilderness Systems Tarpon 140's.

What type of roof rack do you have in the photo? It looks like it works with your factory rails.

[paddlenbike]

Hi Eric,
I am using the old-school non-locking Yakima feet that screw into the threaded wedges of the factory roof rack. This allows you to be able to slide the towers just like you can with the factory rack. I like the non-locking Yakima feet because they sit much closer to the roof--the locking towers are nearly twice as tall. The kayak saddles are Yakima TLC's.

A narrow boat is much sleeker in the water than a wide one, which means you can paddle faster and be less tired than someone pushing one of those ultrawide sit-on-top barges through the water. I would spend some time paddling boats around and see if you can get over that cramped feeling you're describing. Around here (Sacto) there are stores that let you demo boats before buying. I paid $200 and was able to take out any boat in the store for a 3-month period, then I was able to apply that $200 toward the purchase of a boat. There is a huge difference in the comfort, stability, speed and efficiency among even similar looking boats, so see if you can try them out to find the one that is right for you. When I paddled my Necky for the first time I just knew it was the boat I was looking for.

Speed may not seem important but if you are paddling a sit-on-top and your friends are in sit-in boats, you simply will not be able to keep up. Meanwhile your friends are barely putting in any effort at all and they keep looking back at you thinking you are a weak loser, lol. So when the boat salesman talks about speed, keep in mind that he/she is really talking about paddling efficiency.

[ecchamberlin]

Good info. Thanks

I definetely believe that the speed is an issue and your right I just need to take a couple of them out and try it again. Can you recommend any that have larger openings and are more roomy?

[paddlenbike]

Go try out a kayak or two and pay attention to the opening size, i.e. whether you think it should be larger or smaller. Note the make and model and look up those specs online when you get home. Then you will start to have an idea of the range of specs you're looking for, then you can narrow down your search by shopping online based on those specs. In my case, boat width (speed) is important to me and I know that 21.5" is as narrow as I want and 23" is as wide as I will go. That narrows down the boats to 10% of what is made and I can shop online only for those boats. I always try before I buy, but it's a good starting point if certain things are important to you.