High winds

Last week I had a bad scare with sudden high winds that came 6 hours earlier than expected on t/he New River in Virginia, USA. My 1952 Grumman was knocked sideways several times as the wind swirled. Rowing back upstream to the boat ramp was the roughest 2 miles of my life. Would a little ballast in the bow have helped keep me stable, or would it have just been dead weight that would have made it harder to make the corrections to keep me pointed into the wind? I installed an oar lock set up so I'm rowing with 2 oars instead of traditional paddling.
The picture shows how my canoe is set up.

Looking at the picture, it appears that you're sitting above the gunwales to row and that will decrease stability because it raises your center of gravity. Is the boat still moving bow first? (ie: are you pushing the oars instead of pulling them?) You'll generate a lot more power pulling on the oars but, of course, you'll have to look over your shoulder to see where you're going.

You could probably increase stability a little by adding ballast (water, rocks, a dog or beer... oh, wait, you might have "beer" covered already...) but your biggest increase would be to lower your seating (and, probably, your rowing retrofit). It looks like you'd have to move a thwart to sit in the bow seat and paddle (in the traditional manner) stern first but you've already got the paddles for it.

Regardless of how you paddle, one of the keys to safety is knowing your limits and practicing to improve your skills. Whether it's wind, water level or anything else, if conditions become dangerous, get off the water and wait it out.

PS: if you must push your limits, kneeling significantly increases stability in adverse conditions by lowering your COG.
Bonus: it also facilitates prayer.

DavidSteber said:

Last week I had a bad scare with sudden high winds that came 6 hours earlier than expected on t/he New River in Virginia, USA. My 1952 Grumman was knocked sideways several times as the wind swirled. Rowing back upstream to the boat ramp was the roughest 2 miles of my life. Would a little ballast in the bow have helped keep me stable, or would it have just been dead weight that would have made it harder to make the corrections to keep me pointed into the wind? I installed an oar lock set up so I'm rowing with 2 oars instead of traditional paddling.
The picture shows how my canoe is set up.
View attachment 144292

Click to expand...

The rule is bow heavy for paddling into the wind and stern heavy for paddling away from the wind. For a crosswind, you just have to find the trim that keeps the boat from wanting to turn. I've been caught out when the wind came up suddenly and it's no joke.

In windy conditions the heavy end of the boat (bow or stern) will want to point into the wind. This is because the heavy end of the boat is sitting deeper in the water and the light end is riding higher and catching more wind. This causes the boat to want to pivot around the heavy end until said heavy end is pointed directly into the wind.

I ran into this on a trip this past spring when my tripping buddy showed up 40 lbs heavier than last I’d seen him. This made him 40 lbs heavier than me. He was inexperienced and paddling in the bow. We had to make a short crossing with the wind off our starboard side, the wind picked up mid crossing and it swung us around so the bow was pointing into the teeth of the wind. There was nothing I could do to keep it from happening or correct us back on course after it happened. We had to limp in a semi ferrying maneuver the rest of the way across until I hit a wind break and could get us spun back around.

We had a big “rethink” on ballast after that.