In Scandinavia I expect sea kayaking will be the most popular EPP module. People with insight in the BCU educational system tell me that the EPP sea kayak levels are near identical to the similar BCU sea kayak levels.
This should not surprise anyone as the British federation is member of the EPP project.
The somewhat curiously labeled discipline Nordic Sea Kayaking is related to the Scandinavian K1-trainer class which I recently wrote an entry on.
For reasons unknown to me the descriptions of a number of other disciplines haven’t been published. In particular I miss the Flatwater Marathon levels which are pretty cool.
The careful reader will quickly notice that the descriptions of the instructor levels are missing. The federations have yet to agree on these levels.
Not quite unrelated the Danish Canoe Federation has of today started offering classes in some of the EPP sea kayak levels.
In year 2000 I was making my way around the Swedish coast on a two month long trip.
One gloomy day I was paddling to my limit in a strong wind, in a heavy sea with driving rain in my face.
I was rather scared of the conditions but I was low on provisions and was sick of the thought of waiting out the weather. Accordingly I was raging mad at the weather and the world at large.
Late afternoon I reached a yacht harbor for a much required water refill. The small harbor was stuffed with yachts and sailors waiting for an improvement in the weather.
While I made my way around the harbor I was still burning with anger and it occurred to me that all the sailors should consider themselves lucky(!) for having me around to use their facilities. As I told myself “It’s only fair you sissies pay for the facilities I use as I provide you with the stuff your dreams are made of” and equally unreasonable ideas.
Later I was able to laugh at myself but I cannot say these thoughts don’t occur from time to time. It’s such a wonderful concept that the world has to make special provisions for the kayaker.
EPP Black Level push-ups
Unfortunately I’m not struggling along the Swedish coastline these days but drowning in work instead. It has come to the point that I haven’t been in a kayak for a week. As a substitute I do pushups in anger on the office floor and… curses the world at large for these inhuman office environments and for letting me rotten inside them.
The design of these places has a certain underlying sickening disconnect from the human body. Yesterday while visiting a different office building I was demonstrated the fitness room in the basement. Sure it’s an improvement over nothing but isn’t it symbolic that the cramped room without windows was at the very bottom of the basement? If you absolutely must acknowledge the existence of your body then please do it in the basement. I mean the freakin toilets were nicer looking than the fitness room.
One day I’ll design my own office where you upon entering will be met with a pull-up bar AND the expectation to show just how many pull-ups you can do.
From Thursday to Sunday it was time for my annual sea kayaking trip around the Belt Sea.
The name Belt Sea stems from the name of the straits Great Belt and Little Belt that divide Denmark into the three major parts Jutland, Funen and Zealand. These two straits along with The Sound between Zealand and Sweden act as bottlenecks between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea.
On a historical note. Like people everywhere around the world, Danes like to think of themselves as having played a rather important role in world history. We did contribute with some tidbits – however let’s face it. The raison d’être for Denmark was to be the weak and willingly gatekeeper of the Belt Sea. None of the greater European powers wanted us to be able to exercise any real strong control over this crucial water dividing mother Russia, Prussian and the Baltics from the British, French and Dutch powers.
We were good boys and girls, played our humble role alright and therefore we still exist as an independent state.
These days the Belt Sea is the best damn kayaking playground this country can offer.
Our route some 145km. Samsø Bælt = Northern part of Great Belt.
This was the eighth time I organized this trip and for the seventh time I had both German and Danish paddlers along for the ride.
For a couple of reasons I find this trip important:
This is an open invitation advanced sea kayaking trip. I list the requirements for participating in my invitation. You can come along If you think you got what it takes.
Both paddlers from Germany and Denmark participates. During the years this has resulted in a good number of contacts between paddlers from the two countries and a considerable transfer of knowledge. I like that a lot.
Nice following sea helping us along on day one.
For the third time not all the participants made the entire trip. We were 10 paddlers when we started out and were down to 6 paddlers in the end.
On this particular trip I’m not really willing to let go of the ‘advanced’ part in the description. There are a number of organized trip for intermediate paddlers but only this one for advanced paddlers.
I uploaded my own photos of the trip to my sea kayak club’s photo gallery. I hope more photos will be added as the other participants email me their photos.
1. First let me forward the invitation for the first danish Surf Symposium during the days 9-10 of June at Klitmøller on the westcoast of Jutland. The sea kayak board of the Canoe Federation is the arranging body. We very much would like to have participants from our neighboring countries. The invitation is only available in danish but email me and I’ll be happy to help with information in English. Hopefully we’ll have a good onshore wind and some nasty kayak trashing waves.
Unfortunately World Cup Marathon 2007 is scheduled for the very same weekend in Skanderborg 20 km from here. Would have been loads of fun to watch.
2. My annual Samsø sea kayak trip takes place in a week. Currently a good mixture of dedicated sea kayakers and race paddlers have signed up. For the first time in 7(?) years, I think there’ll be more Danish than German paddlers. Perhaps my reputation is improving after all
3. The canoe federation has bought a digital camcorder, which I’ve been doing all kind of tests with during the last 3 weeks. The camera was primarily bought for recording sea kayak related activities and these activities will take precedence. However on days with no sea kayaking events I want to shoot as much canoe and kayaking as possible.
4. Sunday it was time for the 22km “Paradise Race” in the neighboring club Silkeborg Kajakklub. Good fun and for me a much better race than last year. Now placing 14 out of 15 in the senior ICF K1 class could sound like a disaster. But really – at least the first 10 placed paddlers are from a parallel kayak universe. I could be better placed by racing in the K1 trainer class – but I refuse to go that way. Besides I did beat Morten and that’s what really counts!
We shot a movie of the race. Download it if you want an impression of a typical danish kayak race(size 70MB).
I’m still very satisfied with the Supersonic. This kayak is better at doing what it’s designed for than any of my other kayaks. I don’t see myself by another ICF K1 any time soon.
Update: I made another edition of the movie using material showing paddlers from my own club. This edition scores a much higher coolness factor as I mixed in The Kills’ uber-cool No Wow song. This take from one of their concerts is even better than their studio recording.
Division Racing in Denmark:
Danish Design:
Surfer in a Surf Kayak:
Kattegat x2:
Tour de Gudenaa 2007, Saturday: