Hello from the UK

[Sonia]

Hello,
Came upon this site the other day and seemed friendly and helpful. I first paddled nearly 30 years ago on holiday on the Bow River at Cochrane, Alberta. It was amazing!
Have spent most of my time paddling on the Thames in Oxford or the canal.
Didn't paddle regularly for about 10 years as my children weren't so keen when they were young and I didn't want to put them off.
Back at it now - really enjoy getting out and joined a local club.
Had a paddle on the Thames today at a place called Buscot, nice stretch. You can see the two paddles (belonging to my 10 year old daughter) as she was taking photos - guess who did all the paddling today.
We borrowed a friends canoe today as we don't have a licence for the Thames at the moment. Flat bottomed Dagger, very manoeuvrable.

 

[Boatman53]

Welcome Sonia, pull up a stump by the campfire, there’s plenty of room.
Jim

 

[Sonia]

Thanks Jim

Welcome Sonia, pull up a stump by the campfire, there’s plenty of room.
Jim

 

[MrPoling]

We borrowed a friends canoe today as we don't have a licence for the Thames at the moment.

Is the Thames special in requiring a license because of the locks and dams? Or do you generally need a license?

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

I formally welcomed you in your mysterious Mad River serial number thread, but let me do so again. We enjoy any sort of reports and pictures from our members outside of North America.

Had a paddle on the Thames today at a place called Buscot, nice stretch.

Do you go through locks on that paddle?

we don't have a licence for the Thames at the moment

You need a license (American spelling) to paddle a canoe in England or Oxford? Is there any rationale for that other than as a form of taxation to raise government revenues?

 

[jdeerfoot]

Welcome to the site. I just got home from 15 days in Scotland and I saw a number of rivers there that I would have liked to explore.

 

[Sonia]

The licence is required on the Thames and also Oxford canal - possibly other waterways but I'm not sure what ones. The funds go towards waterway maintenance and also for the locks, generally via the environment agency or the canal and river trust. Didn't go through any locks yesterday and didn't get asked to show a licence, it's only the lock keepers than can ask to see a licence. We paddled from Buscot weir down to the next lock and back up again.
I have been through locks before in the past - occasionally at the same time as a narrowboat - it's okay but you have to have your wits about you, it's quite exciting.

 

[Sonia]

Welcome to the site. I just got home from 15 days in Scotland and I saw a number of rivers there that I would have liked to explore.

Thank you Sounds like a good trip, Scotland is beautiful! I haven't paddled up there but plan to in the next few years. I've been hiking there and the scenery is stunning. Hope you get to come back and explore one day.

 

[Gamma1214]

Welcome to the fire. An intro and a first trip report rolled into one... nice!

...guess who did all the paddling today

It's good to see kids who enjoy being on the water (or outside in general) and pictures other than "selfies" are a blessing at that age (though things may be different in the UK).

I'll look forward to paddling vicariously through your reports as I doubt I'll ever paddle that area myself.

 

[Sonia]

Oh, selfies are very popular here too. My daughter doesn't have her own phone, but she did take approximately 150 photos yesterday using mine, random bits of riverbank etc, one selfie. I love the photos on this page - moose and mountains - amazing! We managed a swan with some signets yesterday. Saw some good dragonflies and then just cattle. Nothing very exciting but it was a nice paddle.
I'm assuming there must be a thread for trips on here - I'll have a look. I mostly paddle on our club lake but hoping to get on the Wye in a couple of weeks

 

[Erica]

Welcome, Sonia.

Swans are unusual for most of us on this side of the Atlantic.

 

[Sonia]

Thank you
I didn't realise that - always happy to post lots of swan pics. We went past these quite fast and gave them a wide berth as the Cob (not pictured) looked pretty angry.

 

[yellowcanoe]

OOPS. Just finished posting on your Mad River thread. Open canoes seem harder to find in the UK! So you might get more as I have no idea how UK prices compare with US/ CDN prices.

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

I'm assuming there must be a thread for trips on here

Sonia, there is a forum for posting American Trip Reports and another for Canadian Trip Reports, each forum having hundreds of trip threads for each country.

So far, there have not been enough trip reports from our scattered members in Europe and Australia to justify setting up country-specific trip forums for them; therefore, reports for trips outside of the USA and Canada are currently intended to be posted in the Canoe Destinations and Routes forum.

Depending on which of our six site color themes you are using, you may have to hover your cursor over each forum name to read a more detailed description of the content intended to be posted in each.

 

[Jabberwocky]

Swans are unusual for most of us on this side of the Atlantic.

Eh, you're not missing much, really. The males can be pretty obnoxious, especially in spring or early summer. Some of the "craziest" ones are infamous for actually attacking paddlers, causing the boats to capsize, etc. They even have nicknames Typical March or April posts on Czech forums are along the lines of: "Is Franta on River Berounka this year? Or has he died yet?" "Nope, still there :-( Was harassing us near Kaceřovský mlýn. Attacking from behind, as always." "Yeah, the jerk caused me to spill my beer." Etc., etc.
An article with some photos of the said offender "Labuť" is a swan in Czech, "labuťák" a male swan.

Btw, hi from Prague, Sonia

 

[Glenn MacGrady]

The males can be pretty obnoxious, especially in spring or early summer. Some of the "craziest" ones are infamous for actually attacking paddlers, causing the boats to capsize, etc.

I had that happen to me on my hometown local day paddle 30 years ago. A big swan, probably a male and probably protecting its family in a cove on the far side of the river, came flapping straight at my canoe like a guided missile. My only defense was to cock my paddle into baseball bat position, hoping I could smack the aggressive thing out of the air. Fortunately, it broke off its aerial charge about 20 feet (6 meters) from my canoe.

I paddled away . . . my fairy tale image of swans forever fractured.

 

[Boatman53]

There were lots of swans where I spent a lot of time looking after my customers boats. Yes they were aggressive and would attack the kayakers (not many people canoed there. They would also claim a shoreline and defend it.
We saw Trumpeter Swans last fall in the BWCA.

Jim

 

[Jabberwocky]

I paddled away . . . my fairy tale image of swans forever fractured.

Well, not necessarily but one has to understand that they are the villains :-D

 

[Sonia]

Eh, you're not missing much, really. The males can be pretty obnoxious, especially in spring or early summer. Some of the "craziest" ones are infamous for actually attacking paddlers, causing the boats to capsize, etc. They even have nicknames Typical March or April posts on Czech forums are along the lines of: "Is Franta on River Berounka this year? Or has he died yet?" "Nope, still there :-( Was harassing us near Kaceřovský mlýn. Attacking from behind, as always." "Yeah, the jerk caused me to spill my beer." Etc., etc.
An article with some photos of the said offender "Labuť" is a swan in Czech, "labuťák" a male swan.

Btw, hi from Prague, Sonia

Hi

I really thought the male swan was going to attack, wings high on it's back and neck bent into itself - pushing in hard bursts. It just seemed to carry on past us and I breathed a sigh of relief. I love that you have names for the trouble makers

I've been to Prague, lovely city. There was a picture of Wenceslas Square in an encyclopedia I was given for Christmas as a child and it looked magical to me. Managed to visit in my 20s and was old enough to enjoy the Staropramen brewery tour

 

[Sonia]

Just looked at your pictures - that swan means business!