Delmarva Paddlers Retreat
The Delmarva Paddlers Retreat in Delaware has been an annual gathering for 24 years now and draws many of the best Greenland-style kayakers in the country. At regular sea-kayaking symposiums you’ll hear attendees refer to kayaks by manufacturer name and talk about learning to roll. But here at Delmarva folks know kayaks by museum acquisition numbers and are set on mastering their offside elbow roll or their straightjacket roll.
The event got underway with a skin-on-frame kayak building class by Brian Shultz that just put a half dozen new kayaks in the water at the Camp Arrowhead beach. Yesterday attendees made neoprene versions of traditional spray skirts and red cedar Greenland paddles. Others suited up and worked on paddling and rolling technique with individual instruction coming from a large group of skilled mentors.
Chris Raab teaching Greenland paddle making
Dana Rutherford, in black, with a class on making neoprene akuilisaqs (Greenland spray skirts)
Today there will be a lot of on-water instruction and a talk by Sea Kayaker contributor Moulton Avery on cold-water safety.
Christopher Cunningham
One Comments to “Delmarva Paddlers Retreat”
The 2012 Delmarva Paddler’s Retreat was a wonderful event for learning traditional Greenland skills and developing lasting friendships, and of course playing in the water. This was my first year at DPR, and it will become an October tradition for me for years to come! I was very pleased to meet Christopher and the rest of the DPR guests, all who made DPR that much more special.