Kayak speed

[JME]

Dread to think how far I paddle in a day long session. Back in the late spring I did paddle offshore about 3.5 miles to some sunken mulberry harbours which they failed to raise for D Day in WWII.

Pretty good fishing too, until three dive boats powered up and dumped a dozen or so divers right on the mark. Did consider some high seas piracy for a moment; board the buggers and let rip the dawgs of war. Common sense prevailed and I paddled off a few more miles to another feature I had some intelligence on.

[speck]

Being a long time traditional small cockpit kayaker I was kind of skeptical about the abilities of the "Pungo". My kayak is a 14 foot River Runner. Despite the name it has seen mostly flatwater use for fishing and camping excursions. It is constructed with a stiffening system down the middle which roto-moulds into the seat. This is necessary to support the lightweight "Tupperware" type plastic construction. Therefore I ended up with 4 narrow triangles instead of the usual two. Once I learned how to pack it this became advantageous as I could fit my gear in tightly enough to portage without unloading and messing with packs and such. I would just break my two piece paddle down and use it as a yoke. Kids on canoe trips would be really impressed when they saw this and had many questions for their Scout leaders.

With that kind of background I assumed the large open cockpit Pungo would be a "turtle". It's not I was very impressed. The 'yak I tried was probably a 14 footer and it tracked very very well and paddled like a dream. It has many of the advantages of a canoe with the speed and efficiency of a kayak. The seat was amazing! I need to get me one of those yaks some day. Wish I could find a good used one up here in Southern Ontario, Canada. Most yakkers up here are into Sea Kayaks. I'm not far from (Georgian Bay on Lake Huron.) You don't see many S.O.T.s or Wilderness Systems types of 'yaks.

[glgst]

I paddle a Pungo 140 and think its quite fast, plus theres room for my fishing stuff and the pooch
my wife just got a Tarpon 140 and it seems nearly as fast. alot of the guys out here that fish the Pacific in central Cal use the longer Ocean Kayak models for stability when landing big halibut and lingcod. some guys use WS tarpon 160's and are WAY faster than the OC guys. a friend has the hobie adventure with the pedals and loves it except for a persistant leak on an interior seam.. unfortunatly hobie is reluctant to replace the boat as of yet...
yeasterday the wife and I did 8.25 miles on a sloooow river in 6 hours with 3 naps in the middle and a lunch break. when we were actually paddling, a slow mosey was getting us a bit over 2.5 mph...
Jim

[nighthawk]

I own a canoe but when I do buy a kayak I will take Bill's advice. Here is the link tto the Hobie Cat Hobie Drive:
http://www.hobiecat.com/kayaking/miragedrive.html