A kayak upgrade

After a lot of thought about what we need in a cruising tender, we have reluctantly decided to give up our rowing skiff in favor of rigid hull inflatable with an outboard. While I love to row, our long narrow Whitehall style skiff is not very practical when it comes to carrying extra people and supplies, running ashore, onto beaches or run down dinghy docks, and genrally putting up with the abuse that comes with being our "pick-up truck" when anchored out. This would leave our paddling fix to be satisfied by the kayaks we are carrying with us. Our old thermo-molded Perception kayaks have seen a lot of miles and were due for replacement anyway, so another Craigslist search ensued for some kayaks that had a little better performance.

Our criteria included: fiberglass construction (for weight and performance), good interior volume, and rudders for tracking in wind. They also had to be a matched pair (so that the storage cradles on deck and our lifting and launching gear would be comaptible with both kayaks).

We quickly found a couple of mid nineties hand laid SEDA fiberglass touring kayaks being sold by a local shop at a bargain price. They are not as fancy and full of clever features like newer boats, but they have a classic shape, are very well constructed, and were considered excellent touring boats back in their day.

They cleaned up very well. The gel coat came back to a nice shine with a little polish, and we upgraded the rudder pedals, rigging, and a few other hardware bits.

The difference in performance was immediately apparent. The stiffer smoother fiberglass hulls move the water with very little effort, track well, and have very predictable initial stability.

Next project is finding and outfitting the right tender/dinghy to be our workhorse for when we are cruising.