Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Canoes

Thanks for all the advise. The Mad River IQ system really has my attention. Seems darn practical.

Armed with my new knowledge, I need to do some more investigating on this end .

I'm partial to Mad River canoes. Have paddled an Explorer, and, for me, I think that it is THE perfect canoe.
You won't go wrong with any Mad River canoes. Bell and We-Non-Nah are very close though. And, depending on a specific use, I love the Bells; like their solos are top drawer.
Don

When I was looking, I found the canoe mfg's websites and canoeing forums helpful. I had a john boat with a trolling motor before my canoe which, for me, wasn't nearly as enjoyable as paddling so motors aren't an option. If I want to get somewhere fast, I'll buy a nice fishing boat. Your mileage may vary.... <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />



l wanted a canoe I could paddle solo or tandem, that was fast and tracked well, had a good mix of initial and secondary stability, was relatively light while still being durable and could handle a good load for tripping. I chose a royalex Bell Northwind. Here's a link -



Bell Canoe Works - Northwind



I just took my son out Saturday and we had a blast sneaking in and out of the coves, looking for frogs, turtles, ducks, herons, etc. BTW - if you are canoeing with a 3-year old, a bucket of rocks makes for a fun trip!!!



Straps are much easier than rope....





Lovin' life in his Dino PFD.....





Rocks are good.....





Just soakin' in the sights...

how's she handle whitetail??? ..... john w

I have a couple Grummans- a 16 lightweight, and an 18 standard. My partner has an Oldtown 18, and a Kevlar. The kevlar's been in the water about 4 times over the last 10 years- because of its cost, I guess. That's silly to my mind, but then I didn't spring nealy $1,000 for it. The Oldtown is our farthest in moose-hunting canoe, because it's quiet. The metal ones are used nearer the road (several lakes and portages to get the meat out- and we walk around the first few lakes, leaving the Grumman(s) stashed in the brush).

New canoes, for some reason, tip over a lot. Less so as they season in. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> Tie EVERYTHING in!

for classic wood/canvas canoes these are beautifully made...
http://islandfalls.wcha.org/index.html

we- no nah has a slick website, and the most efficient hulls on the water...
http://www.wenonah.com/

bell canoe works makes some of the most beautifully crafted canoes on the water today...
http://www.bellcanoe.com/

mad river is still made in the traditional N.E. cradle of canoeing... they offer a lot of options and styles...
http://www.madrivercanoe.com/

swift canoe of dwight ontario- beautiful, agile, and, well, swift...
http://www.swiftcanoe.com/

whitetail, been running rivers for over 25 years now, started with a fiberglass mohawk,i n 78", good boat decent rocker but heavvvvvy. broke it in half on a log. patched it up after i got it home, and used it for another few years, sold it to a friend that used it several years.
when my interest got to whitewater i sold the mohawk and bought a 16' royalex mad river in 1984 i do not know which model. we have run many class III rivers with it and once floated the cossatot which is a class III+ that was the wildest and most fun i have had on water.
i have hunted ducks, deer, and squirrels out of it. most of its duty was floating ClassII rivers loaded to the gills with gear for 3 day float camping trips with two bubba sized adults. it responds well has good amount of rocker and a tumblehome beam for stability. these canoes are not cheap i paid 725.00 21 years and still going strong. i do not do much whitewater anymore but have a camp on a classII river here in arkansas so we do a lot of day trips in it.
do not go with the wood gunnells or bamboo seats. we have patched the gunnells several time over the years class III water and big rocks are hard on the wood (we do not always keep the sunnyside up) the bamboo seats rot after a few years.
do not go with the "poly" type plastic laminates as they will delaminate over time.
paddles are another thing you should read up on the wrong paddle will wear you out. i use different types depending on what type of water i will be floating.

hope you enjoy canoeing half as much as we have

My stroke and its effects killed my dream and plan of building two cedar-strip Prospecters ("Beaver" and "Otter") and � among other things� treating some blind kids to the inimitable pleasures of quiet river trips. I still get goose bumps, however, just revisiting the dream.

For the ultimate in satisfying canoeing experience, build your own cedar-strip, of any model that's detailed in the marvelous Canadian book whose name and author escape my rickety memory. (I'll post 'em if I remember 'em.) You haven't begun to sample the real pleasures of the water world until you've spent some time in canoes.

I've white-watered (bow paddle! wet job!) in a 19-foot square-stern Grumman in Alaska � much rather have a cedar-strip Prospector for general canoeing.

.

Although the Mad River and Bell canoes are my favorites, the Prospector is a very fine canoe. A very formidable canoe. Didn't Bill Mason use one of these? Our Canadean <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> friends should know.
Don

Yup.

Everything Mason

Regards, sse

Wow! What a great topic for a "gun forum". Canoe's are a lot like guns- ...You can't have too many- ...and you'll always regret the "one's" you let "get away".

I've got 3 Old Town's right now: The 13' "fisherman" when it was 1st introduced- with a wider more stable belly, and a- square-back stern- (this has been my most used water-craft for several years),- A Discovery 169- 16' & 9" length- great when I have "company"- and am not going "solo",- and I also have the little "Otter" kyack- Just like a Marlin "guide" gun to "grab and go". ...(any-where)

What I REALLY want though- ...is the Old Town "Pack" in RoyalX- which probably weighs less than half what my Otter does- it has one cane seat and plenty of room for tackle boxes & fishing rods.

I also have a vintage Grumman 16' Sports Boat- Which I identified only by chance- looking at a North Dakota Game & Fish publication photograph and story (several years ago) as they were using it to retreive nets of fertile Walleye Pike for the re-stocking of fry into other lakes).

This Grumman also has a full square back stern and a slightly covered prow. It is too old to have a horse-power rating- but would easily handle a 10 maybe 15 horse motor. But this early 50's craft is still a canoe.

The most beautiful, magnificent canoe I have ever seen- was in northern Manitoba- I believe it was the Cross Lake Indian Reservation- and a couple along with a friend had been some days Moose hunting, they were successful (having shot 2 large Moose), and were returning to thier home on the Reservation which was only accessable by water. I had a pickup and we were camped on the "portage way" which we were not aware of.

My pick-up made thier portage a lot easier- and we were rewarded with the best meat I have ever tasted- ( from the "hump" of the Moose).

Any-way, their "canoe" was a Hudson Bay Freighter canoe- cedar-strip- more than big enough for 3 people, 2 Moose, a large cast-iron covered "cauldron" (maybe)? Pot. (whatever) that stowed all thier gear: other cooking stuff: food, clothes,
other utensils, probably their rifle too. But they really didn't have -or need -or want -all that much.

This "boat" was big- ...But it was STILL a canoe.

(And it was also a "square-back" powered by a "new 35 hp. Evinrude outboard.)

Did I even mention a "paddle"? ...The Most I ever used one of those "things" for (through the years)- ...was to filet my fish on. But whenever my motor did fail- It was my paddle that always got me home.

pee wee

bill mason paddled a 15' wood/canvas prospecter through most of the video "waterwalker"....
i got impatient with the parts of the video that were of him painting or sketching, but the rest of the video was pretty cool.....

there was a guy at home in the northwoods.....

tonight was our last opportunity to be together on the river as a family til probably christmas time.....

[img][image]http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a52/hotstick5p/rivershots052.jpg[/img][/image]
[img][image]http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a52/hotstick5p/rivershots050.jpg[/img][/image]
[img][image]http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a52/hotstick5p/rivershots040.jpg[/img][/image]
[img][image]http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a52/hotstick5p/rivershots034.jpg[/img][/image]
[img][image]http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a52/hotstick5p/rivershots029.jpg[/img][/image]
[img][image]http://i9.photobucket.com/albums/a52/hotstick5p/rivershots056.jpg[/img][/image]

If, and it is a big if, I get to go to the Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding, strip canoes and kayaks are what I want to build. I was there last month and saw one built by a student and it was beautiful beyond words. I can do that even with the limitations from my injury. I have built two wood and canvas canoes and they were great but would not begin to compare to a strip canoe.

Hey John, was them pics taken on the White River? Looks about like where I drove through this summer.

P_Weed writes...

Hey P_ I have maybe the closest modern incarnation of that old "Fisherman", a 13.3 Discoverer, gotten for exactly nothing from an in-law whose wife wanted to turn it into a planter (shudder). For some years prior to that he had been filling it with water for his and the neighbor's kids to use as a wading pool, and that canoe STILL ain't broke.

Here it is set up for a student project, the kid and his dad drove it all around a local powerplant lake, GPS in hand, doing water tests at marked points and continually measuring the temperature at the surface and about 1ft down using recording temperature probes (two of them can be seen wired to the motor shaft), mapping temperatures by reference to the GPS track.

The trolling motor is 40 lb thrust marine-spec, and will hustle the canoe along up to 4.4 mph when needed to cross boating lanes and such, otherwise will run all weekend on the two deep cycle batteries pictured.

A perfect stealth vehicle for cruising marshes and wetlands and such.


Note the bolt-on, two "D" cell running lights for after-dark operations. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

Birdwatcher

I have to agree with Ken Howell. There is nothing more beautiful than cedar-strip. I have a 16' Bell similar to Nebraska's and it is great. But my favorite is still the Adirondack Guideboat. Mine is 15 1/2' in fiberglass but I dream of building one in cedar strip. These are rowed, not paddled and they are fast, stable,light, and carry an emense load. What a pleasure to troll a streamer behind mine on an Adirondack lake. When I get more time I'll post a picture. The history of these boats and the Adirondack guides that hand built them is very interesting. The Adirondack Museum in Blue Mountain Lake has a few originals.

Qtip
Soli Deo Gloria!
To God Alone Be The Glory!

Birdwatcher,
I much prefer the set up you show for powered canoe travel to a square stern canoe. With the canoe you show, you have the best of both worlds, a perfect paddeling canoe, and with the side mounted motor, a means of power.
Don

I have a OT Packer and want a guide boat. Looking at the Kevlar boats from Adirondack Guide Boats in VT.

Used to troll behind my grandmother's pulling boat on Lake George.

DMB...

Agreed, and even a 2 hp motor will push a 17 foot canoe at efficient hull speeds (about 3 mph), anything faster than that and the otherwise efficient canoe shape quickly becomes noisy and less stable as it tries to plane. With motors that small and light, putting them off to one side also makes them far more convenient to operate while facing forwards.

Birdwatcher

nah birdy,

them were on the rock river here in N.W. illinois.... headin' out for a job tonight.... see you all around