Well, yeah.....

I've been using it for about three weeks now and I've decided to leave it the way it is for the time being. The way it is: About 13/16" thick by 3-1/4" wide at the tips. The aft face, during a stroke, has about 3/16" of camber, the forward side has 5/8" of camber. The edges are fairly sharp. The paddle profile is ala Chuck Hoist's plans, ie tapered from the ends to modest shoulders at the loom.

In my last post, I think I said I liked the paddle a lot except for a funny little flutter at the exit and the sour feeling the paddle gave when skimming the surface of the water with the heavily curve side down as I normally do on the return following a sweep stroke.

The little flutter and noise at the exit has become less noticeable as I use the paddle. I think I have subconciously adjusted the exit part of the stroke to minimize the flutter and noise and it now no longer bothers me. In fact, I sense a little boost forward with each exit. The catch and the stroke are very solid and quiet.

The sour return of the sweep stroke has been solved by learning the flip the paddle 180 along the loom axis and sweep with the curved side of the paddle aft instead of the flat like you would during a normal forward stroke. The switch takes far less than one second, just a matter of flicking the wrists really and makes the return very sweet. The sweep itself doesn't seem to suffer much.

Meanwhile my rolling and scullng skills have improved substantially as the paddle gives a lot more lift than any paddle I have ever used. This results in much less swimming time, even when the roll isn't done exactly right. Less swimming means more time to practice the techniques themselves, hence improvement progresses faster. The added floatation is helpful as well.

As luck would have it, the piece of Western Red Cedar I used for this paddle is considerably lighter than the piece I used for the last paddle and though the new paddle is a lot thicker, it is noticeably lighter! Still, it seems strong and stiff enough.

As time progresses and my rolling and sculling skills get better, I might consider reducing some of the blade thickness and asmmetry some, mostly out of interest to see how it would fell. For now, however, I'm pretty happy with this paddle as is.

BTW, Cape Cod & Cape Ann were blast. Great kayak surfing with convenient sandbars 100 yards offshore on the ocean side and quiet paddling on the inlets, tidal rivers and bays. Water as clear as anything I've seen north of the Bahamas with white sugar sand beaches. I'd do that again in a heartbeat.

Craig