Birth of the Drifter
I had spent the last few weeks looking at kayaks on e-bay. Some seemed to be ideal with starting prices of only 99p! I soon discovered that this price dramatically increased just before the auction ended and most of the plastic and composite sea kayaks were going for around £500 or more. There were a couple of canvas canoes which went for about £50 and this was what I started to look for. On major problem with this was that most of the boats I found attractive were located in the south of England and getting them home would be difficult. However I at last found one north of Edinburgh and managed a successful bid.
Arriving home with canoe on roof rack
I arrived home with my new canoe and immediately carried it down to the loch (I live in Lochluichart and am lucky enough to have a loch at the bottom of the garden!). A wooden paddle was included in the sale but I managed to break that pushing off from the beach! The next day I went into Inverness and bought a new paddle costing £35! and at last tested the boat in the loch. The canoe was, I think, quite old and was canvas covered but did not let in any water. The cockpit combing seemed lower on one side and there was a little bit of damage to the keel but apart from that the boat seemed sound. However, assuming that the boat was fairly old I was worried that the canvas might have lost its strength and made the decision to re-cover using PVC.
Covering with PVC proved to be quite an expensive exercise. I bought the material from Tom Morrow Tarpaulins in Inverness costing about £60 and spent the next few weeks taking off the canvas and replacing it with PVC. I had to replace the rubbing strips, bilge keels and cockpit coaming frame as I could not get these parts off in one piece. I added plastic balls (bought from Tesco) to the bow and stern as buoyancy and varnished all the frame before covering.
Canvas and cockpit combing removed
Back to the loch again for a second trial. The boat performed well. All that was needed now was a spray deck and one or two odds and ends and I was ready for the sea. The spray deck proved a problem as there did not seem to be any commercially available that might fit the old cockpit design so I had to make one out of spare PVC and fixed it with press studs to the combing.
Finished canoe at Lochluichart dam
Getting to the sea proved to be not as easy as I thought. Although the west coast of the highlands is very assessable by car there seem to be few places where launching a canoe is easy. The first place I discovered was Loch Torridon where I found two or three sites just west of the village where I could get into the water without too much trouble. There was a fair easterly breeze blowing when I set off which, fortunately did not allow the waves much reach to develop but even so I found it quite choppy round the headlands of the small bays on the north side of the loch. Once again the canoe performed perfectly and I was quite pleased with my first venture in salt water.
Next page Torridon to Shieldaig