Favorite tripping tip or trick learned on-line?

[Guest]

What you really need in those environs is a sand wedge, maybe with a telescoping shaft? But then you'd need golf shoes, with soft spikes of course ( soft for hull protection, not the greens). Cat holes could double as putting cups, before using for you know what.

I’ll confess. I have played golf during one backcountry paddling trip. Miniature golf.

We were camped on a wide sandy beach and my sons found a golf ball. We had one and a spare in the bocce set and had the line throwing Titleist for the tarp. Four golf balls.

We each fashioned a putter from a piece of downed wood and took turns crafting the lay out for a short course, complete with little bridges, berms, hillocks, obstacles and traps. The course, as it evolved, was pretty demanding of putt placement and we had hours of silly fun with it. If we had stayed another day we might have had a windmill.

That does beg the question of camp games and entertainment, which can be a peculiar joy when family camping with children (or childlike friends)

 

[Odyssey]

Windmill!! There goes my afternoon coffee all over my shirt.
Okay, seeing as how I'm probably the guiltiest guy here for going off topic, I'll try to steer myself back to trip tips...
...cards. As a camp game, cards can't be beat. They're very portable and small, most have a moisture resistant coating of sorts, and any number of games can be played with the full average deck. (I've often been accused of playing without a full deck, but have no idea what that means.) My wife shrugs off my request to play cards on canoe trips. Hell, I don't know why? I stopped asking for strip poker a long time ago. My late Mom and her large family all played cards at every family gathering, and hosted Euchre parties all the time. Despite the fact we all know that game, I seldom play. (It's been said playing Euchre is a requirement to joining our family. The second requirement is to start out losing. It's only wise to work your way up the pecking order, and into our family hearts, by becoming another family card shark graaadually.)
Our kids played Crazy Eights by candlelight on trips. A seldom played favourite is this:


To be on the safe side, you can always leave the little finnicky counting pegs at home and just bring tooth picks, or whittle new ones. I've had to do that before.

 

[riverstrider]

I've learned all sorts of tricks and hacks, especially from McCrea threads, but it was an encounter with another mutual acquaintance, Tom Wilhelm, known in some circles as "canoeswithduckheads", that is my "aha" moment: bungie balls. You know those loops of thin bungy cord secured at one end by a plastic ball that are used to secure canopy tarps? I have found all sorts of great uses for those things, and never leave on a trip without them. My solo tripper has slotted gunnels, and I when I loop these balls through them it creates multiple, interchangeable and easily modified points to which I can secure my load. I also use two of them to secure my sven folding saw to one of my thwarts, forever solving where to pack that dang thing without losing it.

-rs

 

[Guest]

it was an encounter with another mutual acquaintance, Tom Wilhelm, known in some circles as "canoeswithduckheads", that is my "aha" moment: bungie balls. You know those loops of thin bungy cord secured at one end by a plastic ball that are used to secure canopy tarps? I have found all sorts of great uses for those things, and never leave on a trip without them.

Were they white bungee with white balls?

Years ago I admired a friend’s use of those bungee balls and he sent me a box of them. A box with a dozen dozen. What the hell and I going to do with 144 bungee balls?

Oh, distribute them to friends. I think I may have a half dozen left.

 

[Odyssey]

I wonder how handy it might be to have a thread somewhere, that lists all the small gadgets in categories we might want to discover and buy? Something like this:
Bungee Cords----internet address
Cargo Straps and Buckles---internet address , internet address

and so on...


I suggest small gadgets first, because really popular items like knives, axes, canoes and such may run to pages. That may not be an entirely bad idea though. I know there is a small company site section, but having a listing of gadgets etc as apposed to companies might be also helpful. Just a thought.
As for canoe fasteners, I'm not happy yet with what I've got. I tried using bicycle inner tubes cut as rubber bands to use as bungees; for my paddles lashed to thwarts for the carries. Nah. I tried rubber twist ties for the same and other uses. Nah, but maybe. I don't want to swap out nor drill my tubular aluminum thwart and my kneeling thwart. But seeing on-line people drilling holes in their wooden thwarts and running bungees with little balls for easily sliding paddles into place for carries set me off wondering. That on-line trick/tip is a great customizer I have yet to make work for me. I'm still working on it though.

In another site universe far far away, Mike started a thwart bungee thread that set me on my wandering way searching for a better way to attach things to my canoe.

 

[ppine]

The main thing I have learned is the value of going solo.

I have played bush golf lots of times on canoe trips. We bring some old irons like a wedge that can take some rock hits. We use the beach and try to stay out of the water. Sometimes we hit across the river and paddle over to the hole. A big tree or a picnic table makes a good target, or a tent.

 

[riverstrider]

Were they white bungee with white balls?

Yeah, those were the ones. I have a ton of them from a tent canopy, the sides of which I had to dispose of. Just lately they solved a problem on how to most easily secure (and then take down) some holiday lighting. Handy little buggers.

-rs