Forward Paddling.

Full steam ahead with the DW preparations. I hadn’t planned to do anything until Monday (today) but following a Friday and Saturday which were marked notably by excesses in food and drink, Sunday afternoon we managed to get onto the water.

Nigel doesn’t have a boat so I borrowed my dads and after failing to launch from Ironbridge (due to some kind of festival) we put in at Frankwell.

First problem is that Nigel is a giant. He is six foot something tall, my dad and I on the other hand are normal height which meant that the footrests in my dads boat were not set for someone who is longer of leg. Unable to adjust them any further down the boat Nigel was forced to bring them all the way to the top so he could get his legs in. For a first paddle I didn’t think it would be a problem that Nigel would have no footrests.

Nigel’s not really a bad paddler at all. He was quite nervous wobbly to start with, and nearly threw himself in at one point but quite quickly he got his confidence up and had spells of good solid forward strokes.

As we went along I tried to doctor his stroke technique, pointing out when he moved his hands on the paddle shaft and showing him how different strokes moved the boat but I think I turned into a bit of a nag. (I must remember to temper my bossy side. He’ll work the strokes out in good time.)

We spent about an hour on the water, and managed to get to the Agricultural Showground which is about two and a half miles round trip. Nigel was starting to get frustrated with the boat as it kept unexplainably turning him around, and the moved footrests were digging into his shin so it was not a bad time to stop.

For me it was a chance to get back onto the water after not lifting the paddles for well over two months. There were a couple of motorboats about on the river as well, which upset Nigel’s rhythm but gave me a chance to wash hang and play about in their turbulence.

I think (hope) Nigel enjoyed it and he did say that he would have to pick up a cheap boat on Ebay so that he can tailor it to suit his lanky frame.
He can have my spare set of paddles. If I remember, tonight I will put some markers on the shaft with elastic bands and insulating tape, so that he can feel when his hands move out of place. That should help a lot. All in all I’m pretty happy.

Tonight I am running the Wrekin as part of the seven day fitness plan, the bonus is Nigel isn’t working tonight either so he has agreed to come. Time to see how fit we really are I guess.