KASK Forum - Raglan

Friday 8th - Sunday 10th March 2013

Leaving the Coromandel, we started off for Raglan to the KASK (Kiwi Association of Sea Kayakers) Forum at the Raglan Kopua Camping ground. We stopped off at Te Aroha and went for a stroll around the old hot springs domain - the Edwardian era buildings are in good knick but the springs are looking a bit dry with the drought.

We arrived at Raglan early afternoon and stopped off at Orca restaurant (yes more mussells!) for lunch, and watched the parage of kayaks on cars & vans roll into town. We arrived at the venue and met up with Evan & John, who we met 2 years ago at Anakiwa, and helped with a bit of set up.

Max from Q-Kayaks had 8 sea kayaks on his ute, but can carry 11, plus several sit on tops!

On Friday night after the welcome we had a flare demo and shot off a couple of dozen orange smoke and red comet flares. We couldn't set off the parachute flares as it was too windy. The one I had was a fizzer & didn't even look that old - there were some from the 90's that still worked whereas much younger ones didn't.

Flare demo

 Saturday was set to be a couple of mystery sessions, chaired by JKA. It turned out to be a team challenge - 7 teams constructing kayaks out of cardboard and packing tape. I was the captain (more a facilitator) of one team - our kayak looked a bit like a punt until we closed in the ends a bit. I was the designated paddler, based on weight (!!) as well as supposed paddling ability (since none of my team had ever seen me paddle). We called it Kiwi's Revenge as I figured part of the fun might be to dunk the Aussie!

Sealing the bottom - a good move!

The crew of the Kiwi's Revenge

Charging for the finish line - not quite fast enough!

Surprisingly all seven craft floated. We ended up doing 3 races - I came second in the first 2 and we had a different paddler for the third - by this time only ours & two others were still afloat  - the rest were soggy piles of cardboard. It was a very competative event actually, with protests and a bit of sabotage. As can be seen from the above photo the gunwales are a bit high which affected my paddling style!

In the afternoon we watched Mike's talk on rolling and Paul & Natasha's talk on their Whitsundays trip last year. Happy hour, then an interesting talk on the journey of Sean Smith (FatPaddler) back from injury and trauma to his paddling achievements and kayaking trips. The final video he showed was from the cardboard kayak comp - check it out - I am the one with the red paddle & orange headband.

On Sunday we paddled along the Raglan Harbour, finishing amongst the limestone cliffs  - weaving through narrow slots. The Forum concluded after lunch with a talk by Tim Taylor - who paddled around all three islands of NZ in 2011 (concluding 2012 after having to wait to round Cape Reinga at the end of the season). Most of the group dispersed after that, but a smal group stayed another night - the Aussies, Paul, John, Evan and the group training with John in the morning. Many pizzas consumed though they seemed disproportionately covered by pineapple!!  Thanks guys for a great weekend!

Kayaking the Limestones