• We apologize for the somewhat convoluted sign-up process. Due to ever-more sophisticated attacks by chatbots, we had to increase our filtering in order to weed out AI while letting humans through. It's a nuisance, but a necessary one in order to keep the level of discourse on the forums authentic and useful. From the actual humans using WCP, thanks for your understanding!

Recent content by alexsidles

  1. alexsidles

    How to get from Port Hardy to Bellingham by ferry

    By far the best is to have a friend or loved one drive your car from Bellingham to meet you at Port Hardy. This will take most of a day each way and involve an expensive ferry crossing, so it's not the smallest thing to ask. If you can't find anyone to come pick you up, you might find a place...
  2. alexsidles

    Which VHF radio would you buy?

    That whole thread is here, including a link to an audio recording of the VHF radio traffic during the incident. As John Abercrombie mentions, during a capsize in Grays Harbor, Washington, I experienced many difficulties summoning rescue using a voice-only VHF. It was difficult to manage the...
  3. alexsidles

    Folbot Single wanted: Citibot, Gremlin, Kiawah

    I've got an old Folbot Kodiak, but the aluminum frames are frozen solid so it is no longer packable. You can have it for free. I'm happy to drop it off anywhere in Anacortes next time I am up there, which should be in April or May. Hull has patches but is waterproof. Spray skirt and removable...
  4. alexsidles

    A September lap of Nootka

    I'm not a fan of busybodies at the beach. The advice columnist Dan Savage often remarks that there is only one qualification you need to give someone else your advice: that they asked you for it. I think Pascal got it right the first time: let the noobs be noobs. And let me also add that this...
  5. alexsidles

    Using A GoPro While Paddling

    I’m not skeptical of 4k screens, provided they have enough real estate to display the pixels at a reasonable size, which a laptop screen does not. And I totally agree, OLED is a must if you are going to be displaying 4,000 pixels! I’m also not skeptical of 4k cameras per se, so long as they...
  6. alexsidles

    Using A GoPro While Paddling

    [Edit: Deleted. Too ranty.]
  7. alexsidles

    Using A GoPro While Paddling

    Does it even make sense to shoot 4k on a GoPro? The sensor size is tiny: 1/2.3 (6.17 x 4.55 mm). Cramming ever-more pixels onto the sensor isn’t going to turn it into something it’s not. It’ll just be 4,000 pixels of blown-out whites and color banding. I’m also not sure it makes sense to try to...
  8. alexsidles

    does the loose load cause problems shifting in rough water or if you do a roll

    I’ve never found the shifting of a load to be a problem, and I’m a heavy guy who packs heavily. You can definitely feel it when 10 pounds of tripod and 30 pounds of drinking water shift from one side of a compartment to the other, but it doesn’t destabilize the boat, even in rough water or...
  9. alexsidles

    Current Designs sold - future plan is to bypass dealers with 'direct to customer' model?

    It also has umami, feng shui, and dharma. It’s quite a kayak. Alex
  10. alexsidles

    Clayoquot Sound, Vancouver Island, BC 2–8 Feb 2024

    Thanks for the kind words, everyone. Clayoquot Sound is spectacular, for sure. I did pay the Ahousaht stewardship fee. The Ahousaht don't have treaty or court-adjudicated title to their traditional lands, but they almost certainly do have aboriginal title. (I saw the ancient culturally modified...
  11. alexsidles

    Clayoquot Sound, Vancouver Island, BC 2–8 Feb 2024

    Cross-posted on alexsidles.com CONTINUED FROM PREVIOUS POST. The big attraction in Clayoquot Sound is Ramsay Hot Springs in Hot Springs Cove. Hot Springs Cove routinely appears on lists of Canada’s best hot springs. It’s not the largest, the hottest, or the most comfortable, but its natural...
  12. alexsidles

    Clayoquot Sound, Vancouver Island, BC 2–8 Feb 2024

    [Cross-posted on alexsidles.com] The night before my trip, I switched my intended destination from Desolation Sound, on the sheltered waters off the Strait of Georgia, to Clayoquot Sound, on the decidedly unsheltered waters off Vancouver Island. Weather forecasts were predicting that a steady...
  13. alexsidles

    Tenasillahe Island, lower Columbia River, Oregon 26–28 Jan 2024

    [Cross-posted on alexsidles.com] The quintessential coastal deer of the Pacific Northwest is a subspecies of the mule deer (Odocoileus hemionus) known as the black-tailed deer. In a classic splitters-versus-lumpers argument, some locals, the “splitters,” refer to the black-tailed deer as a...
  14. alexsidles

    Kayakers charged with breaking Parks Canada, wildlife laws in Nunavut

    Well done, Rick. I didn’t realize they had hired a snowmobile into the forbidden zone. It doesn’t exactly need Sherlock Holmes to catch them at that point! Alex
  15. alexsidles

    Kayakers charged with breaking Parks Canada, wildlife laws in Nunavut

    I'm astonished that the kayakers were caught. Bylot Island is the back of beyond. The island has an undeveloped, arctic coastline hundreds of miles in circumference. The nearest town of any size, Pond Inlet, is almost 15 miles (24 km) from Bylot Island, on the far side of a deep-water channel...
Back
Top