Wind threshold

Just got back from Iceland
No paddling, but just hiking in sustained 35 mph winds ( with 50+ gusts) over lava beds really wasn’t that much fun.

And last year, MDB and I paddled. A small ADK stream ( Minerva Stream)… In a spot with fully treed shores, I suddenly got pushed around, and saw MDB do a full rotation and then some before the mini twister moved on to a nearby reedy spot. We watched the reeds swirling about until the little twister faded away. Laughed, but both agreed that if we had been on big water, we would have had quite a problem. There was no way possible to control our boats, even though the stream was as no more than 20 yards wide!!

Been wind bound on Indian Lake (ADK’s) in October, otherwise we generally stick to smaller waters and aren’t affected by big winds.
Oops, just remembered an early spring trip to Rock Lake (ADK’s near Blue Mountain Lake)
Lake was still half covered with ice, had a hellaciously strong thunderstorm with high winds and we heard trees toppling and limbs snapping all night. Next day we heard that a licensed guide was crushed by a falling tree in the Pharaoh Lakes wilderness.

When I first got my canoe I was pretty excited to use it. I hit some small local lakes.

Once I went out with my youngest daughter…all of 60 lbs or so. I’m not small, 250+. Just went out for a paddle, no gear and I foolishly sat in the stern seat. Ballast was all wrong, bow was riding high out of the water. It was a little breezy but out on the water the wind felt like 10x.

A gust would totally gave its way with us and there was nothing I could do to control it. Started getting worried that we wouldn’t get back to the boat landing. Hugged the shoreline tight and would dig the paddle in the bottom when a gust would hit to hold position. Paddled backward for awhile, then straighten out and paddle like mad when the wind relaxed. Repeat that process every gust.

recped said:

I will tolerate a bit more for rivers.

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I am also more tolerant of big wind days on rivers, but this can change on big rivers. I'm remided of a trip on the Black Canyon of the Colorado, below Hoover Dam, that I like to call the best and worst canoe trip of my life. My wife and I rented a canoe (fortunately we got a good boat, an OT 16-foot Penobscot). The first half of the trip was phenomenal. Nice sunny day, desert flowers in bloom everywhere, decent current. We got out at Arizona Hot Springs for lunch and a soak. Heaven.

That changed after lunch. We were unaware of the periodic desert winds that kick up, and from our lunch spot we battled a crazy headwind the entire rest of the way (about 5 miles or more) to Willow Beach Marina. At one point, as we paddled for all we were worth just to make headway, a mallard landed next to me looking for a handout. Finding no joy, he started swimming his way past us to see if he had any better luck with Mrs. Riverstrider. Yes, he swam much faster than we could paddle that Penobscot. About two miles from Willow Beach, we could hear shouts across the river...it was a small group with inflatable duckies hanging on to shore to avoid getting blown upriver...one of them had broken their paddle, and there was no spare. They asked us to have their rental pick-up come get them. We got to Willow Beach about 2 and a half hours later, exhausted, and I found two guys waiting for the duckie group we had passed, and let them know of the situation. The two guys just looked at each other knowingly, and then rock-paper-scissored to determine which of them was going to be the gofer.

After a mandatory visit to Boulder City Brewery, we slept like the dead.

Tsuga8 said:

I have a lot of fears about wind, but having a boat break up under me wasn't one of them! What type of material was it? Was it bridging waves that did the damage, or what?

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The boat has a glued lapstrake plywood hull, it's light and stiff, designed for double paddle. A prior owner added the sail rig, a BSD Classic Canoe 36. The hull was never designed to sail, much less with a tall rig twisting it in a fresh breeze, and a tall man hiking out the other way. The lap split wasn't catastrophic, but we did start taking water. I made some hasty repairs that night. Afterwards I decided to luff in gusts, then use a shorter rig, and finally to buy a canoe with ribs to sail.

Well, just did it.
Cancelled a trip due to forecast wind conditions. Well not truly cancelled, just bumped it up a few days.

Been having some beautiful fall weather thus far and have been itching to get out there before the inevitable rainy/windy fall weather hits.

Sustained wind speeds above 10-12 mph and I find paddling is not enjoyable and sustained wind speeds above 25 mph and I find sleeping comfortably in a tent is difficult.

Day 3 of the Adirondack 90 mile canoe/kayak race was cancelled yesterday. The temperature stayed in the low 40's all day with high winds, gusting to 31mph, making conditions dangerous, especially for the large number of first time racing paddlers who were among the more than 250 boats in the race. Friday's first day paddling weather was perfect, at 70 degrees and favorably light wind. Saturday began cloudy and threatening, but with a brisk southern tail wind, paddling the 12 mile length of Long Lake resulted in a much faster than normal passage to the end and entrance into the Raquette River. But soon the forecasted steady driving chilly rain fell for the entire afternoon. I saw many paddlers tough it out to the finish without having any rain gear protection to war. I suspect a large number were new to typical Adirondack marathon racing weather and suffered for it. Some in fast kayaks who had previously passed me slowed enough for me to pass them in the cold rain before the day's finish, while others who were fast the day prior I did not see come up to me.

On Sunday morning the temperature was around 40 degrees prior to the start time, and the wind had noticeably kicked up even where we were assembled in heavily wooded cover in the state campground park. As the paddlers for the more than 250 boats gathered, the race director explained that rain showers with high winds with gusts to 31mph were predicted with temperatures not getting out of the 40s all day. We had three large open lakes to cross to the finish that can be tough with large waves even in normal wind conditions. I know that many of the racers from yesterday's rain still had only wet clothing to wear. So for only the second time in my memory, the third day of the race was cancelled due to dangerous conditions. Good call, as was proven during my 3 hour drive home from there.

I was on a weekend trip to Massasauga Provincial Park with my wife, 4 yr old daughter, and our dog this past weekend. We encountered similar weather to what @yknpdlr just described. On Saturday we had a 15 mph headwind, 20 mph gusts and got over an inch of rain in 50 degree temps. Sunday the wind was supposed to be worse with rain and cold temps in the morning. We decided to paddle the 9 miles out in the rain and headwind rather than get completely wind bound on Sunday.

We did just fine in our loaded tandem explorer in the 15 mph headwind, only stalling out a couple times in some bad gusts. We had to stop around lunch and get everyone hot drinks under the tarp and wrap the dog in a towel to stop her from shivering.

This was the limit of what I would consider paddling in with the family. It was a challenge but never felt unsafe. We also were not paddling any large lakes. I imagine that would have changed things.

I'm so happy to have read through all the previous posts. There have been many times over the years when I've wondered if I'm being overly cautious when it comes to paddling in (against?) the wind. It's nice to know there are so many paddlers who I admire who have many of the same concerns I've had over the years. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on this subject.

That's all for now. Take care and until next time...be well.

snapper

I wish I had looked closer at the wind forecast. Being wind bound for 5 days without decent opportunities for exploring and fishing was terrible, a waste of $ and time. Next time, I’m doing this too. I was just too thrilled with getting a permit and getting out for the first time in years. Although, had I seen the wind forecast, I basically would have missed a trip this year, as permits are very limited.

We have been able to deal with a lot of wind running rivers. Paddling early and getting off the water in the afternoon helps. Paddling lakes in the wind is a different story. I really don't like it all.

I had a battle with the wind two summers ago on Cree Lake. Knuckle biting.

On the upper Swannee River the wind blowing upstream is enough to cancel out the river flow. It’s like you’re going nowhere.

Depends a lot on which canoe I'm in and where I'm paddling....or if I'm paddling.

We do an overnighter on one of the local rivers that's class 2 or 2+, depending on flows. I like to do it poling a tandem. It's a lot of work in the rapids compared to paddling a river oriented solo, but the last couple of miles is flat and almost always with a pretty stiff headwind (because we never break camp early). Poling along the bank, I have it much easier there than the paddlers.

In fact, I generally can handle more wind standing with the pole than I can paddling my best solo canoe - as long as I can reach the bottom most of the time. But...there was that one time poling down the Snake River a 30mph gust suddenly broached my lightly loaded Prospector against the current and I dipped the upstream rail briefly... enough to take on several gallons. Thought I was going to swamp it there for a second.

Paddling....~20mph is where I'm wondering what I'm doing out there. I can go against it okay in the Solitude, but it cuts into the short period waves instead if riding up if I'm going straight into them . If they get very high, they're coming over the bow.

Couple of summers ago, I had paddled the Solo 14 up the "Thoroughfare" between lower and upper Priest Lake. Coming back out into the lower lake in the afternoon, I was suddenly fighting a 25+ mph headwind and a lot of fetch with two foot waves. Had to paddle like my hardest sprint to make headway at a crawl. Fortunately, I only had about a quarter of a mile to the take out. The boat stayed perfectly dry though.

Steve in Idaho said:

Couple of summers ago, I had paddled the Solo 14 up the "Thoroughfare" between lower and upper Priest Lake.

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I paddled that nearly 20 years ago when I spent a summer traveling the PNW. I was working in Hayden for a week or so and while out exploring I saw the lake and thought it looked like a nice paddle. I can remember being very impressed by what I saw and also by the lack of people. I don't think I saw anyone else. Is it always that quiet?

Priest Lake Panorama by Alan, on Flickr

Alan

The original post was sucked off into the whitewater nebula, so Glenn asked for a recap for this thread. Here it is plus some extra info that has since trickled forth from the lower rear lobes of the cerebellum to more towards the forefront.

My first run in the Grand Canyon was 1990 in a Mad River Kevlar ME. The wind (of course, upriver) was so strong in some sections that, like Glenn upthread, I was sideways on a low brace to the downstream water side, which was "upstream" on the wind side! I was often being blown slowly upstream in the reasonably fast downstream current for longer stretches than I liked. The bad gust would eventually slow enough that I could get the boat turned 90 degrees and start paddling again, but never seemed to last for long. My last run of the Big Ditch was 2002, over 20 years ago now,. and there was wind then, but in shorter boats, which were more easily controlled.

So getting blown around happens in rivers, too. Mainly big rivers, of course. I've also been blown around on the Columbia near home, but then it's waaaaay bigger than the Colorado. A couple hundred thousand or more cfs. Not as big as the lower Mississippi. Maybe not even as big as the middle Mississippi? I like small, steep, tight, technical rivers (like Glenn), even if I can't do that stuff any longer. Arthritis and other maladies preclude much paddling these days. I seem to remember getting blown around a bit even on small streams, but can't remember any specific instances or details.

There have been similar experiences on sections of the lower Green River in Utah, near Moab, in Canyonlands Park and upstream a ways. On those runs I'm paddling tandem with my wife in a big 18-1/2 foot Wenonah Odyssey (no longer produced), which has a straight keel, not rockered and "spinny" like the ME. The Green is a major feeder stream to the Colorado, comes in not far above Cataract Canyon in the Colorado, which feeds boaters into Lake Powell. I don't class it a really big river, but certainly bigger than the norm I'm used to. It is also famous for its winds in sections of the river. In boats such as those what we've had trouble with is getting "wind ferried" when gusts hit us as we're traveling downstream. We might be parallel to the current, but often at an angle to the wind when it whips up as we turn a corner. The wind ferries the boat to the shore that the bow is pointed towards, and hopefully we end up in an eddy over there that we can escape from.

One year we put in at Ruby Ranch, and the headwind was terrible getting the six miles down to Trin Alcove (aka "Three Canyon") where we wanted to do a layover camp because of petroglyphs on the cliffs there. We got ferried into an eddy once and it took us a half hour to get out of it and continue the mile or so down to the side canyon and our campsite. Another year we did the regular Mineral Bottom to Spanish Bottom run, and the wind in the Turks Head region (30 miles below our launch) was really bad. We were getting windferried all over the river from Soda Springs to Deadhorse Canyon, which is only a couple miles, but seemed to take hours to cover. We ended up camping just a few miles farther down because we were so tired trying to beat against the wind. I swear we bounced off both shores at least three times each just getting that far. We didn't get stuck in any eddies that trip, but it wasn't because of any real paddling expertise -- just luck. Both of those trips had big wind-driven swells going upstream on this normally flatwater run. Those aren't the only times we've had wind on that river, but what I would consider the worst I've experienced. I've heard stories from others as to it being so bad that they couldn't move and had to make up the time later to meet their van or jetboat shuttle out.

Alan Gage said:

I paddled that nearly 20 years ago when I spent a summer traveling the PNW. I was working in Hayden for a week or so and while out exploring I saw the lake and thought it looked like a nice paddle. I can remember being very impressed by what I saw and also by the lack of people. I don't think I saw anyone else. Is it always that quiet?

Priest Lake Panorama by Alan, on Flickr

Alan

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I wish I could say I've been there enough times to know.