The wild water racing paddlers regularly take 4.5m long composite boats down Grade 3. As has been said before, the longer boats go faster, although you pay for that with less manoeuvrability. If eating up the miles on still or green moving water is your aim then look at something longer than 11 feet.

Opportunity plays a big part. This summer I went with a group of Girl Guides to Uganda. We took them rafting with Nile River Explorers. All the safety kayakers and all bar one of the raft guides were black. In the village near Kampala where we spent most of our time the kids hadn't even seen a pictu...

Take your BCU card though, the first lock on the Thames at St Johns is the only one where I have been asked to prove BCU membership.

The document that Adrian is referring to is the "Terms of Reference" , you can read it here http://www.canoe-england.org.uk/media/p ... 20V4-1.pdf Page 16 covers site specific guidance for L1s.

Now sold.

Basingstoke Canal CC are selling their Anas Acuta for £150.
Made by Valley, this is one of the early boats which comes with ocean cockpit and no bulkheads. Pump fitted. Decklines and elastics have been replaced. Based Surrey Hants border. Pictures here http://www.b3c.org.uk/buyandsell/

No sorry,probably the furthest north I will get in the next few weeks is Leighton Buzzard or Milton Keynes.

Junior Harrier, one of the very early general purpose kayaks designed for children. Length 3m27, beam 57cm . Will take kids up to about 5 foot tall/age 11 or 12. Used mostly on the canal with very few scratches. Only £35
Based Surrey/Hants border.

The wild swimmer we saw getting out of the Thames this morning was wearing considerably less than you, a definite shortage of fig leaves along the bank.

The marathon canoeing website is here http://canoeracing.org.uk/marathon/index.php/race-results/ (but it is mostly kayak racing) Marathon racing is not as popular in the North as it is in the South. It may be worth looking at the historical results to find a racing club near you, Runcorn or Chester ...

In reference to "swede" form, I think this refers to the country. The first edition of the BCU Canoeing handbook (1981) refers to "Swedish Form" craft and "Fish Form" . I think subsequent references have just got lazy and dropped the capitalisation. I wouldn't get too hung up about the use of Englis...

I did it too - 21:34 in a K1. Not bad for a 52 year old fat sea kayaker Sprucey I have just looked at the results and see you are from Southampton- so you must be the guy in the spotty boat we chatted to on the pound who said he was the slow one in his team. 21.34 is not slow in my book, well done....

My buoyancy aid did the course this year with a friend and I've decided that next year I should be wearing it. ... Liz I wrote that last Easter and I am pleased to say that my buoyancy aid made it down the course again, this time with me inside. Well done to everyone who finished, including from th...

3 ladies entered the Devizes to Westminster Canoe Race this year in single canoe, they all beat the 2 blokes who entered in C1 :) http://www.dwrace.org.uk/results/2014/Results/MondaySubClassResults.html I went to the LPS and had a great time. It was fun paddling whitewater with other ladies and with...

I am not sure how they got their costs so low given the number of days it took to print and all the time involved to screw it together. You could get an "Elmer the elephant" colour scheme in composites if that takes your fancy.

West Mills Swing bridge at Newbury and the low one just before Bulls lock are listed as compulsory portages on the Watersides website http://www.watersideseries.org.uk/documents/Rules2014.pdf Rule 15. I remember watching a K1 going under the latter before it was a compulsory portage, he couldn't hav...

Have you planned a journey using Canalplan and cross referenced it against your list? http://canalplan.org.uk/index.html
You show West Mills Swing bridge as a portage, taking the total for Devizes to Newbury as 37 whereas the Watersides website cites 35.

Paddle tandem?

You need to have a clear idea of what you want money for, as grant giving bodies are often quite specifically focussed on their targets. If you have a lot of young people in the club then the Youth Opportunities Fund is quite good, but the young folk need to apply. We have had £4500 for white water ...

There are a number of touring loops in the Midlands region which use the canals to get back almost to the beginning. From Swarkestone you can go down the Trent, through Kings Mills and back along the Trent and Mersey canal to within a few 100m. From Hayton in Notts you go along the Chesterfield cana...

Is this another DW question by any chance? I use wings for marathon, sea and wavehopper. I use flats for slalom, polo and my Burn. It takes me a few mins to adjust from wings to flats. Wings are very positive on the catch and don't flutter when pulling hard. When first learning with wings , they do ...

There looks to be a nice piece of flat deck between the stern toggle and the entry point for the rudder wires...
but I can understand you not wanting to make modifications to your new toy.

Sorry. I was thinking of you having just read your post on the DW thread and didn't check who the original poster was.
Liz

A photo, such a simple request! I will have a look. It was a technique used by some friends of mine when they did the DW in 2009 in a canoe. The truck of the mountain board was screwed to a small piece of wood which was fixed between the gunwhales very close to the stern. There being sufficient free...

Hi Lennart,
If you are on Facebook have a look for Sam Rippington. she paddles at Wokingham Watersports Centre and I know they have a Canoe Ergo there. Craig Hill from Marsport is the other person who may be able to help.

Mark, Get a pair of wheels off a mountain board and mount on the stern deck so on the portages once the boat is out the water, flip it over and pull it. This is much quicker than faffing with a trolley. Don't bother with refitting the spraydeck after each portage on the canal section, you are better...

I think it's probably to do with when rotomoulding solid colours, changing from one to another the first few out the mould are not true to the new colour but carry some smears of the old colour. If you run some mixed colours this doesn't show.

BCU terms of reference here http://www.canoe-england.org.uk/media/pdf/BCU%20TERMS%20OF%20REFERENCE%20V4-0.pdf Read page 11 about the need to check about AALA licenses if the coaching will include "Moderate waters" . I think it should do for 3 star WW. (You have already said that under 18s will be co...