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Inflatable Kayak by Sevylor and spear shaft supplier

Thread Status: Hello , There was no answer in this thread for more than 60 days.
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Cingene

Will Dive for Food
Mar 4, 2003
400
31
0
I'm back from an extended absence and thinking of getting a inflatable kayak to get around the kelp. Has anyone have any experience with this particular one. It's a Sevylor 2-seater inflatable. Another question, a while ago there was this thread that was discussing a spear shaft supplier which was the best deal I have seen. Does anyone remember the name of that particular supplier?

To long gone,

Cingene
 
nevermind? I put that link up in my reply before I started kayak bashing:) . However I did follow that link to the inflateables and they seemed pretty nice.

You should let us know how they handle compared to a ridgid hull.
 
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oh man...so I'm the test animal for this here experiment. OK..will do...this weekend for sure.
 
inflatable kayak mishap

Finally, we took the kayak for a trial run. The place was Carmel River Beach in, well, Carmel. There was a little bit of swell but nothing too bad.

We planned out our Kayaking adventure. We are suppose to get on the edge of the kelp forest and go dive until we get our fill of the area not going far from the kayak, then to try another place and do exactly what we did before and so on and so forth.


After inflating the kayak (it took less than 10 minutes)in the parking area, we were ready to carry my precious (borrowing from the Lord of the Rings) to the sea. We put our gear on it, fins up front, paddles strapped on the side, dive belts infront of the seats, and yes the spear guns strapped onto the same d-rings as the our straps for the paddles. We got suited up and were ready.

We carry the kayak a bit heavy at about 100lbs with weighs and gear on top. We manage to get it by the water. I noticed that once in a while the swell produced a big enough wave to give us some trouble but my spearfishing partner suggested that it was ok. So alright, I agreed. We pull the kayak on the water, he gets on, I push it, and what happens next was absolutely incredible! From out of the blue A big wave suddenly came up, I yell WAVE!!! Too late! The diveyak flips over, with a spearo on it, and the gears scattered. My fear was someone might have been accidentally jabbed by the spearguns (with no cap on the tips). Luckily, no one was hurt (especially me), so we start gathering all the floating and none floating gears. We found everything but my old dive knife. We then pulled the kayak back into dry land thankful that we were lucky not losing more. But then i saw the kayak. One of the bladder had deflated. Further examination revealed that it was punctured, by one of the spearguns. :waterwork :head.

Lesson learned from this mishap.

1) When in doubt, do not launch kayak (waves can cost some heartache or worse)

2) Do not strap spearguns onto the kayak if you do decide to launch it on a not so flat day. Maybe you can tow a dive bouy or a boogie board behind it until you get to calmer waters. If you do decide to strap on the spearguns on the inflatable diveyak use caps for the shaft tips.

3) Clip everything in. Don't just use the straps. :duh Luckily my camera was clipped on and i didn't loose it. My car key was also and was still there. However, everything else where scattered. even the equipment that were strapped down and took us about an hour to find everything, but the knife.

4) On Sundays, go to church first before launching.

This will be an ongoing experiment and will add on to this list later after I patch the hole and find some more mistake one can make on one of these beauties. So no test yet, next week will go again. To sum it all I will up, I consider this mishap's cause "operator error" :head and will chalk it up to experience.


'Til next time:hmm
 
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Hey Cingene, sorry couldn't make it with you guys. If it was your first launch, I would have suggested launching from the tiny cove on the right of where you launched(protected by the right side of the cove wall) - it's always sheltered from the waves & a great place to practice entries.

Sorry to hear about your yak, at least everyone was safe & you learned a lot from it :)
 
Hey Fuzz,

This weekend we'll try for Salt Point. Have you ever been there? If not using the kayak, maybe just spearfishing.
 
There's a spearfishing meet up north in humbolt that I have to go to...

If you go on Sunday, I could dive ther on the way back.
 
If you're going to try a kayak, even an inflatable for the first time, head out of Ft Ross or Stillwater. And taking a board or kayak out of Carmel river or Monastery is asking for it.

Harold, I heard somthing about the Picasso Open coming up...? And whaddya wanna do abouty the teak stocks? Blast me a mail, and the Ab Grab dates have moved as well.
 
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alright...saturday on my way to Stillwater with the whole gang of clowns that were with me to Carmel.
 
Sven,
YGEM :hmm


Cingene,
You talking about Stillwater in Carmel or Stillwater up north? I'll probably be in the Picasso Open this Saturday at Ocean Cove - easy access & smooth entry.
 
smooth, eh?

Yeah, with about a 100 other wannabees all hauling their stuff to the water at the same time... :hmm Now thats the definition of flotsam.

Actually both Stillwater in Sonoma County and Stillwater at the Golf Course on 17 mi drive are both good places to slide a board into. Entering Stillwater up here gives you access to Roaring Bull reef and Cemetary and Glass House. Other than that, it's pretty cleaned out. Still water down So is dakine for access to Point Pinos, the castles and the Pinnacles though it's a haul. :crutch There are some of the largest cabezones I've seen hanging out at the rock straight out from the beach, unless they've been harvested by the Cen Cal types.
:head
 
Wouldn't subject Cingene to joining the zoo - I was just planning on camping up there ;)
 
We are planning to go out on Saturday over at Stillwater Cove. Hopefully we won't put the spears through the Kayak again:duh We be the ones the people are pointing to and laughing at :blackeye because we can't even put the kayak in the water.
 
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