Solo Canoeing on a Wooden Canoe (The Kenosha by White Salmon Boat Works)

My video solo canoeing on the Sea Eagle TC16 Travel Canoe:

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Recently I am a bit obsessed with canoeing. I bought an inflatable canoe about 2 weeks ago and have been canoeing in Galveston. And a few days ago I also purchased a wooden canoe locally in Houston. I found the canoe on Facebook market place. It was a Kenosha by White Salmon Boat Works. It was awarded “the best paddle boat” at the Portland Wooden Boat show in 2001, 2006, and 2013. My Kenosha was built locally in Houston by a Norwegian American, Knut Bulow, in 2010. It got a silver award at the Keels and Wheels Concourse D’Elegence in the same year. Knut has back pain, so he can no longer canoe and his daughters don’t have a place for it. Therefore, he sold it to me at a very good price. I felt lucky to have it now and I am probably not even deserved it. About storage, I store the canoe in my parents’ garage.
The weather was terrible in Houston over the weekend, but it cleared up Sunday morning and I decided to head to Palmetto State Park to try out the Kenosha. I did research online how to portage a canoe by myself but later found out that It was impossible for me to put the Kenosha on top of the Jeep all by myself since the Kenosha doesn’t have the center thwart and I couldn’t balance the canoe on the shoulder by myself. I will probably add it later. And notice that the Kenosha is 19 feet long. Luckily, my dad was home to help me lifted it up onto the top of my car, then I secured it to the roof racks and also the front and the back of the car. It was around noon when I got everything ready to head out.
I made a mistake not to knot the robe to the front and the back of the canoe to the car and the canoe shifted when I was driving on Highway I10. So I had to exit and stopped at a gas station to re-secure the canoe. After that off I went all the way to Palmetto State Park, about 2hr and 15 minute drive from downtown Houston.
The moment I parked the car in front of the park office to get the day use permit, a few rangers stopped by and complicated the canoe. They also advised me to use the Oslow Lake to try out the canoe because the part of the San Antonio river that ran across the park is flooded and dangerous after a few days of heavy rain.
I was lucky to have a ranger helped me get the canoe off onto the ground, and I could easily carry the canoe by myself to the launching dock which is only a few steps away. I learned that it’s important to keep my knees bent when I carry the canoe by myself. It’s not the strength, just the technique because the canoe is only 50 pounds after all.
Oslow Lake was perfect to practice canoeing because the water was very calm and the lake wasn’t so big. The kenosha cut through the water beautifully. I flew my Mavic Pro around the lake trying to film myself canoeing back and forth.
I usually retrieve the drone when the battery hits around 30%. So when the battery indicated 34%, I was canoeing back to the launching dock to land the drone. When I arrived at the dock, the drone was about a few feet away and it had around 15% battery. All of the sudden it decided to fly back to where I launched it on the other side of the lake all by itself to land. I lost control of it. The last thing I saw on the screen was that It crashed somewhere between some reeds and branches. I docked the canoe, got Coton and walked around the lake trying to locate the drone but no luck. I got back to the canoe and tried to go around the edge of the lake to look for it. I spent about 2 hrs looking before I finally had to accept the fact that I really lost it. Well at least Coton and I was ok. And we really enjoyed watching sunset over Oslow Lake.
After that I decided to spend the rest of the afternoon canoeing around the lake and practiced all the strokes that I was learning. It was a great day at Palmetto park. I am grateful that I got the Kenosha and I am glad to try it out for the first time on flat water.
It was around 7:30 pm when I carried the canoe back to the grass area next to my car. A park visitor stopped to compliment on the canoe when I was cleaning it up. So I asked him to help me lift the canoe on the top of my car. I was so glad he agreed to help. After that I strapped the canoe back to the roof racks and the tied the canoe down to the front and the back of the car. I got the canoe down pretty well this time and didn’t have any problem driving back to Houston. But of course I was only driving around 55 miles per hour and the limit was 75.