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S e n d T h e m T o G r e e n l a n d
R e c e n t l y . . .
February '06 
Sweetwater Kayaks Winter Symposium, teaching Greenlandic technique during Greenland Week, from the 21st through the 24th, and the Winter Symposium from the 24th through the 26th. Check out Bonnie Aldinger's blog for her review. Or Jennifer Pivovar's website.
Or Following Sweetwater, we also hosted a greenlandic pool session for staff at Sea Kayak Georgia... they got warmed up to the 'in the water' idea right away!
March '06 On March 3rd, Turner gave a talk on Skin on frame kayak construction at an event hosted by the Aloha Foundation. See their site for more information about this Foundation.
From March 11th to March 26th, with a teaching engagement in Auckland, New Zealand, teaching at the Coastbusters Symposium smack dab in the middle of the trip. This was an extraordinary event. New Zealand vibrates! Literally! Hissing vents and dormant volcanoes, hot springs everywhere... And the water... So much beautiful water, stetching on and on and on, undulating between smooth sands and craggy cliffs of practically every imaginable formation...
And I almost forgot the cute little blue penguins that kept circling us in the water while we were teaching rolling...
Too much fun!
For more info on the event itself, please visit the symposium website.
We're back home in New England... after four flights and 28 hours of 36 in the Air ;-/
April '06 
Sunday the 2nd, 9th, and the 7th of May, we had three more pool sessions in Wallingford Connecticut. These wrap up our 2005-2006 indoor season. We wish to thank everyone who attended these local sessions. Hopefully we can do it again this fall and coming winter! On the 18th of April, we gave a slideshow presentation after teaching Greenland Style in the waters near Barrier Island Kayak, in Swansboro, North Carolina.
A special thanks to Lamar Hudgens, owner of Barrier Island Kayaks, who hosted our appearance, and Thomas Duncan, fellow greenlandic geek, who whipped interest in the class up into a veritable frenzy! Great folks, joined by several other enthusiasts. Being here also offered us the opportunity to paddle Bogue Inlet, on a nice bumpy day, the day before class.
For more information on what Barrier Island Kayaks has to offer, go to their website.
From April 20th to April 23, we taught and demoed greeenland-style technique at the Eastern Canoe and Kayak Festival in Charleston, South Carolina. Good friends Phil Ellis, Robin Morgan, and Michael Arnett manned to QajaqUSA booth, while we made ourselves available, teaching all comers. Some wonderful and enthusiastic folks got into the swing of things, for sure!
Saturday night at Charleston, Cheri and I reprised our kayak dressage from Delmarva 2005, for an appreciative South Carolina audience. Not even a sound system failure could distract us from our intended rolls! This much fun should be illegal!
On the way back north, we stopped at Nag's Head and paddled in and near Oregon Inlet for an afternoon.
We want to go back there for a week!
On Thursday, April 27th, Cheri offered a 'Yoga for Paddlers' class for the Sound Kayakers Club. Check out the Kayak Adventures website for more info on our up coming class with tthis club on August 14th.
On April 29th, the 3rd Vermont Madness took place in Burlington, Vermont.
This is always a blast, an educationally based, judged rolling event that is very relaxed and low key. Really! The emphasis is on learning, and having fun doing it! David Miskell and Tom Lamson do a cracking job of setting the table. Plus the mad paddle the next day is always an interesting diversion!
May '06 On May 13th, Turner offered a demo of Greenlandic technique at the Adirondak Mountain Club's Paddlefest event on the Hudson River.
June '06 On June 3 and 4, we did a 'Greenlandic Intensive' in the Finger Lakes area of NY state for groups of greenies from Rochester and Ithaca. Jennifer Pivovar, our host provided quite a spread and some fine native Reisling to set up the Saturday night slide show on Greenland. Try this link to glean more information. Or this link with follow-up pics
Ongoing, every Tuesday evening in June, and every Thursday in July we have practiced rolling and bracing at the Portland Quarry, across the Connecticut River from Middletown, Connecticut. For more info click here.
July '06 On July fourth weekend, we went up to Muscongus Bay for two nights of camping. Too far away from the fireworks, but close enough to collect and prepare fresh mussels for each dinner's meal!
July 8th through the 12th, we mentored Greenland-style afficienados in Burlington Vermont, at the Vermont BCU weekend. We would have pictures from this event but unfortunately our camera chip decided to balk and fail! Ugh! For more information, check out this link.
On the 18th, we gave a presentation of our foray to Greenland last summer to the local library.
On July 23rd, we taught Greenland-style rolling and strokes at Sea Cliff, New York...
...to a small group of very good and fun NYC paddlers. They rode out of the city, we supplied all the gear and everyone had a rollicking rolling time. A great location for rolling, only 30 minutes from Manhattan. Check out the pics here.
August '06 
Inuit Clamp. Photo, Turner Wilson, 2006
The first two weeks in August, Turner did a Skin on Frame kayak workshop near Sharkey Point on Seneca Lake, New York Area. Jennifer Pivovar and Brad Carmen worked incredibly hard, and their efforts rewarded them with two SOF, one sweet little rolling qajaq for jennifer, and Brad's qajaq, based on his frame and some ideas taken from one of my SOF. More pictures are here.
On Sunday, August 13th, we traveled up to the North Shore of Massachusetts to run a Greenlandic Intensive for North Shore Paddlers Network. This was exceptional fun! Met some great present and future Greenies and so was spread the 'Green Love'!
On Monday, August 14th, did a greenlandiic rolling workshop for Sound Kayak Club in Norwalk, Connecticut, in association with Michelle Sorenson's Kayak Adventures LLC.
On August 18, 19 and 20, Cheri taught Greenlandic rolling skills at Ladies of the Lake, a sprited, women-only event in Michigan.
Diane Carr assisting Cheri teach newbies at Ladies of the Lake. Photo, Turner Wilson, 2006
Saturday night, we presented a slideshow on our trip to Greenland to a very receptive audience. Turner offered a greenlandic session to boyfriends and hubbys feeling left out of the loop. A good time was had by all! Thanks to Danny Mongno of Impex Kayaks and Bill at Downwind Sports for sponsoring our appearance!
We then trucked up to Lake Suprior Provincial Park on Lake Superior's East shore for 4 days of incredible paddling and camping, setting up base camp on a wonderful little cove on the Devil's Warehouse, we had the opportunity to savor Superiors many moods over 60 miles of wilderness coastline paddling, camping, and skinny dipping! Well you can't get away with that often in Superior!Pictures from this adventure soon!
Refreshed and re-energized, We headed back to the States to teach at Michigan Training Camp, held at Camp Lookout, Lower Herring Lake,
Usually held the last week in August, this is one of our favorite events on our calendar. A really cool location, on a small freshwater lake with a small, swaled outlet to Lake Michigan. Many of the finest American G-Style practioners mentor here, and it is wonderful to see so many of our Midwest friends here.
Turner leading the strokes class. Photo, Jeff Bjorgo, 2006
Special kudos to Diane Carr and Nancy Thornton, who assumed responsibility for the Camp this year from founder Dave Braun, who this year, when any question came his way, said, with a twinkle in his eye, 'Not my problem!' Master trail chef impresario Michael Gray of Uncommon Adventures kept the collective high going with simply extraordinary meals. And let's not forget Dan Segal's martinis...
Pictures from this event have been posted all over the internet. A great set of pics, by Dave Dahlquist, are posted on the QajaqUSA website, here.
September '06 We mentored greenies at Arctic Boat Weekend in Mystic, Connecticut, on September 9 & 10. Held under the auspices of Mystic Seaport, one of the finest maritime museums in existence, under the leadership of Mark Starr, attendees were exposed to the full gamut of our growing skin on frame qajaq culture, here with an Umiak assembled and put to the test, boats and paddles being built in various stages of development, and, of course, on the water mentoring and skill demonstrations. Cheri and I ran through three rolling demos as well as one of our dressage routine for additional fun.
We zipped up to Wells, Maine to check out some real estate ;-)))... And the next day with hurricane swell off shore we tried our luck in Ogunquit Inlet and the eddy line between it and Ishmael's Cove. You can see from this picture that the waves are running all sorts of different ways. Too much fun!
Ishmael's Cove. Photo, Turner Wilson, 2006
On the 17th, we attended Connyak's annual picnic. The high point for us was getting a crack at Dennis and Joy McNeil's stripper double, which is fast and rolls pretty well too. We got a lot of rolls to work, forward-finishing stick among them, but the double straight-jacket will have to wait for a bit more time in the boat, as the timing has to be flawless!
On the 24th that we zipped up to Shelburne, Vermont working with Champlain Valley Kayak Club. The collective good karma of the event participants, organized by club leaders David Miskell and Tom Lamson, overcame an ominous forecast. As it was the 40 knot winds held off until the afternoon session, with all competent rollers/paddlers, we all paddled out and rolled in the lee of a small island. Those of you that think waves only happen on the ocean, should know that Lake Champlain is capable of of presenting significant challenges to a paddler. To finish the afternoon, Tom and David and Turner rounded the island into the teeth of a horizontal wind, had great fun runnning near beam on some 6' short period rollers about to slash the Island's cliffs, and then surfed back to the put-in a mile in the blink of an eye...
The next day, David, Cheri and I left the beach a Shelburne Farms for a foray into the teeth of a brisk 20 knot Northwesterly and 3' waves over to the Four Brothers islands, just offshore from NY State, before paddling back to the Farms. Good freshwater surfing fun was had by all...
October '06 It was our special pleasure to host young New Zealander Ben Dorrington, to a day of surfing at Narragansett Beach, cruising the sublime Newport, Rhode Island coastline, as well as bundle him on to the Delmarva Paddler's Retreat.
Ben paddling the RI coast. Photo, Cheri Perry, 2006
We hope that he enjoyed his visit as much as we enjoyed hosting him.
Again this year, we are taught at Delmarva Paddler's Retreat in Delaware on October 5, 6, 7, and 8. This is among our favorite kayaking events. The original GP-only symposia in the United States, it is always great, and this year was no exception, as gale force winds turned Rehobeth Bay into a pretty fractured cauldron of very short period wind waves, and many flatwater-only folks and other newbies got there first surfing experiences in boats ranging from hardshells to skinboats, even the Camp's fleet of 9' sit on tops!. Whatever works!
Turner in Friday's gale, while on surf patrol. Photo, Brian Schulz, 2006
Delmarva organizers, guides, and attendees rolled with the punches, reformatted most of the wet activities, and really rocked many folks skill sets. The dry land offerings, from mitt and paddle making, to surveying replicas, to yoga for paddlers, as well as several outstanding evening presentations, including an excellent presentation of an East Greenland experience by Qajaq Copenhagen's Martin Nissen, held folks interest right through to the clambake on the beach that the Sunday stragglers enjoyed to finish up a wonderful, hellacious skinny stick party... Many pictures from this event are being presently posted on the QajaqUSA website.
October is a great paddling month in New England! Sparkling foliage, refreshing air temperatures, bracing water temperatures. What is not to like?
Cheri is offered two free yoga classes for paddlers, in late October at the
We held a one day Greenlandic Intensive, back at Seneca Lake, NY on Sunday October 22. Several current and prospective greenies of good cheer gathered to work on their skills in 25 knot winds. Folks weathered rolling sessions in either the fetch break at the beach, or, for those with good rolling foundations, out on the 3' chop. Strokes class turned into circuits up into the rollers run followed by stern rudder work in following fetch. Jennifer Pivovar again supplied the site just north of Starkey Point, not to mention some awesome chili which warmed everyone up at lunch. A good time was had by all!
Sea Kayak Georgia skills week kicked off on Tybee Island, Georgia on the 28th of October, running five full days. If you have never paddled the triangle off Tybee Island you are in for a tremendous treat! You can always find interesting conditions there.
Marsha Hanson, Ronnie Kemp, and company run one of the finest events of its kind, and many of sea kayaking's finest coaches show up to work with some very motivated paddlers, many of whom are coaches in their localities, boosting their skill sets in every imaginable form of kayak. Cheri and I are honored to be back, offering an all day skinny stick intensive to folks from all over the world. Several of this week's coaches also dropped in for varying durations before and after classes to get a taste of what we're all about, Hada Feldman, Phil Eccles, and Jeff Allen among them. I think this points to continuing, growing interest in the Greenlandic skill set.
One of the constant issues we have is not having the time to take the pictures that are in the mind's eye, so that we can share them with you. In teaching situations, there never seems enough time! But, tangentially, we did have a spot of photographic fun with the Halloween Party!
We awarded Andrew Stark, of Clearwater, Florida, a greenland blade donated by Bill Bremer of Lumpy Paddles, as the most improved Greenlandic paddler during the event.
The next weekend, on November 4th, Turner ran a greenlandic workshop at Jordan Lake, North Carolina, for some of the same folks, and others, that attended the Barrier Island Kayak sessions in April of this year. This group of kayakers are really getting deep into their skill sets, be it rolling or strokes, and it is always a pleasure to be involved with such infectious enthusiasm! Dawn Stewart posted a short precis of her day on her blog.
On November 11th, Turner had the pleasure of working with fellow skinny stickers Wes Ostertag and Ed Lamon in the surf environment of Narragansett, Rhode Island, thanks in no small part to a perfect fall day that produced a constant supply of 3 and 4 foot green waves.
Woven through the Holidays and the Winter Solstice, we have again been hosting pool sessions in Wallingford, teaching and horsing around in equal measure. And getting in a paddle or two...
Now it's time to turn the page on a wonderful 2006!
Comments? Questions? Send mail to: h2o@kayakways.net
G o
T o p !