kayak project

Here are some pics from a few years ago when we built the kayaks. We bought the plans from Cheasapeake Light Craft. They are made from sheets of okume plywood. The sheets are cut according to the measurements on the plans then they are wired together. Strip boats are built on a frame but these dont have a frame the shape of boat comes from the individual pieces fitting together. The wires attach two pieces togther temorarily like twist ties and then the joints are reinforced with thickened epoxy and the ends of the wire are cut off leaving a row pretty brass dots. Next the deck is attached with brass nails and the whole thing is fiberglassed over.

Blue Spring Cave

We drove up to Nashville Friday night. It was the worse traffic I have ever encountered. There were like 5 different traffic jams. We met Will up there and all stayed with Joey and Aimee. With 35 miles of passage Blue Spring Cave is the longest cave in Tennessee. Our group of 13 included Tamra who was the first person to squeeze into the longest part of the cave. It was pretty cool having her as a guide. The cave had tons of really cool formations and Jason got some good pics. There were a few squeezes and a hlf mile of crawling. Followed of course by turn around and do another half mile crawl. It was close to midnight when we got back and I was so tired I went straight to bed without even taking a shower. Sunday we had an easy trip back although we were sore and scratched up.

Suwannee River Trip

We haven't done much kayaking this year thanks to El nino. When it's not actually raining the rivers are flooded. We decided to do a kayak/camping trip and had to go all the way to the Suwannee to find a river that wasn't flooded. The Suwannee is set up for kayak camping. There are state parks every 20 miles with river camps in between so camping options every 10 miles plus plenty or wilderness camping.
We headed out Friday morning and had arranged a shuttle with one of the local outfitters. We put in at a little park and Lucas and I loaded the gear in the kayaks while Jason ran the shuttle. It was like 4pm when we fially got on the water and we had 12 miles to go so we paddled hard racing the setting sun. Luckily it was a full moon so we were able to see without the headlamps even after sunset. We got to the first rivercamp and there was one other group there. Since they were on the camping side we stayed in one of the screened sleeping platforms. I'm glad we did cause it rained that night and all our stuff stayed dry and we slept in the next morning and waited for it to clear up. Saturday we paddled 20 miles and stopped at a state park to eat lunch. When we got to the river camp all the platforms were taken so we stayed in primitive camping. Since we like privacy and quiet it worked perfect. Friday we were the only ones on the platform side and Saturday we were the only ones on the camping side. Sunday we just had 6 miles to the take out then a long drive home.