Scott Bristow wrote:
>
> This weekend I was planning on heading up to the Ocoee Friday night to pick
> up a Kix and a Nyami Nyami (Slate River Kayaks new two person ww kayak) for
> some friends of mine and then heading to the Green Narrows for Sat and back
> to the Ocoee to watch the rodeo finals and paddle the river.
report snipped to save bandwidth......
>
> I have not had that much fun on the Ocoee in a long time. This Tandem
> thing is a blast. Joe and I are going to take it down Section 4 a few
> times and then paddle the Narrows in it.
>
> I can't really compare it to a Topo Duo as to which is better. I do know
> this boat boofs very well, was very controllable and basically a complete
> blast.
>
> Oh Chuck, If you are reading this please disregard the rest of the post.
> The only part that matters is after this point......... The Slate River
> guys never showed. I don't know where your boat is :)
>
> Scott Bristow
Scott,
I was interested to read about your tandem run. My wife and I own a
Slate River tandem and used it in Idaho this summer for a number of
runs. Your remarks are right on the money for this boat. Because of its
shortness (big compared to a 007 but short for a tandem- it is about 11'
which is shorter than the old K-1's of yore) and performance design it
is important to either balance the weight in the boat or at least have
the heavier paddler in the stern. I outweigh my wife by 80 pounds so if
I paddle the bow the bow-steer that develops is not controllable, even
with the bow seat moved back. I don't know if this has any relation to
your problems with bow angle control on some moves. With me in the
stern, we can easily pivot the boat on its own center axis like it was a
solo boat. The more you paddle with a given partner the tighter you get
on moves. For us, there was a transcendental point where everything we
did was in perfect synchrony while eddy hopping on the EFSF of the
Salmon. WOW! That was mega-fun. We have not creeked in it yet but it
easily caught microeddies for us. Steve and Guy have creeked in it up on
the U.P. of Michigan with no problems. I'll be interested to hear about
your section IV run.
I haven't liked to post much on it because the Slate River guys are
personal friends of ours and this could seem somewhat biased. However,
we do love ours. It adds a lot of fun to our paddling repertoire. It is
indeed heavy. It would be nice if it were lighter but we don't notice
the weight on the river, only when carrying it and loading it up on the
racks. The weight is due to the thick plastic which has an upside of
making it bombproof. It doesn't oilcan like the Topo Duo's will because
the thick plastic is stiffer. You take the pro's with the con's, I
guess. The performance K-2 market is a real small niche market. For the
right couple or partners, this is a great boat.
Cheers.
Jon
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