Fat Paddling....

On a really lovely spring afternoon in Sydney yesterday, I was joined by Sean Smith, the world famous Fat Paddler on a demo paddle of a couple of our boats. Sean is a real character, an ex Rugby player who has spent a bit of time lately recovering from a serious car smash that has cut short his footy, & left him in need of a new physical challenge. He set himself to do the Hawkesbury Classic, a 111km race from the foot of Sydney's Blue Mountains to the mouth of it's biggest river, which he completed last weekend after 6 months of training. He's documented everything on his excellent website, fatpaddler.com.

Yesterday was all about giving our two big blokes boats a run, so we went for a paddle around Middle Harbour in the NDK Explorer HV and the Valley Aquanaut HV. Sean's been paddling with a rudderred boat since beginning his Hawkesbury Classic quest, so it was a new thing to get into a design where directional stability is more dependent on your core strength & body weight distribution, as opposed to your big toes. He got the hang of it pretty quick, as I tend to expect from people with a sporting background, and was soon getting the boats to head in the generally desired direction, despite a building sea breeze mostly on the beam. We rounded Grotto Point into some small wind chop, & Sean did what all good demo paddlers should do, & pushed the boat in bigger water past his comfort zone, into the ...er.... liquid zone. I reckon you never learn much about any boat unless you're prepared to fall out of it!

After a quick rescue we rode the building wind waves back into the shelter of middle harbour & spent half an hour working on the holy grail of all kayaking, proper body rotation. All up a beaut arvo on the water with one of Sydney's paddling characters. Keep an eye on the Fat Paddler.com for updates on Sean's adventures!