By Brian Kamsoke

Contributing Writer

Perhaps no other style of boat has the elegance and grace of the simple canoe, and yet no other style of boat has as long and storied history as the canoe for functional and recreational purposes, either. Indeed, the basic canoe design can be traced as far back as ancient Greece. Throughout all of history, the canoe has traversed rivers, lakes and even oceans, carrying people and supplies great distances.

Today’s canoes are not all that dissimilar from those early designs, though they certainly have enhanced design features that have improved their efficiency, made them faster and lighter and made them able to carry more weight with better stability. Today, there is a canoe design for any purpose: canoes that are light and stable for short portages, long and sleek for competitions, as well as your basic-style canoe for family recreation and fishing.

Above: Terry Pochkar paddles in the bow as John Raymond paddles the stern at the state Route 205/23 fishing access site in Oneonta, the second stop of the Mixed Stock Aluminum Relay race, on Sunday, May 29, 2005.

How you go about selecting your canoe depends on how you intend to use it, not to mention how much money you want to spend. Some of the competition canoes can run a couple thousand dollars, while some of the basic recreational canoes you can pick up for a few hundred dollars.

"We’ve had our canoe for years. I’m not even sure how old it is," says Susan Waring of Vestal. "We take it camping. We take it for day trips. It’s just great family fun."

When shopping for a recreational canoe, the first consideration is the canoe’s design, or more specifically, its length. Canoes vary in length from 10 feet to as much as 23 feet; basically, the shorter the canoe the better the turning radius. Shorter canoes are more maneuverable and are the first choice for whitewater canoe enthusiasts.

A longer canoe can carry more weight and generally tracks better (or, in other words, stays on course better in wind and waves). Most tandem canoes are 15 to 18 feet in length. If one person is using a tandem canoe, you’ll need ballast to keep the bow even. Widths vary from 33 to 40 inches for tandem canoes, with wider canoes, being more stable; however, wider canoes may also track less efficiently.

Another consideration is a canoe’s bow and stern profile (sometimes called the stem), which affects the way a canoe slices through the water. A canoe with a vertical entry (a design seen mostly in competition canoes) will slice cleanly through the water, which means good tracking, but it also means you might get wet when riding in waves. A more- rounded entry will allow the canoe to ride up and over waves, with the trade-off being that it won’t track as effortlessly.

Canoes can also have a round or V-bottom. Round-bottom canoes are more maneuverable, but track less efficiently, while V-bottom canoes track better, but are less maneuverable.

As you can see, there are many design elements to take into consideration. Your choice of design features is dependent on how you plan to use the canoe. Once you know how you plan to use it and you’ve decided on the necessary features, your next consideration is the type of material used to construct the canoe, which is really what determines most of the cost for your canoe.

Material also determines the weight and durability of your canoe. Fiberglass is probably the most typical material, but cost and weight can vary quite a bit depending on design. Royalex is a sandwich of plastics and dense foam, which is durable, quiet and about middle-of-road in terms of weight and cost. Polyethylene (plastic polymers) is cheaper than Royalex, but it’s heavier and less durable. Aluminum is the most durable, but relatively heavy and noisy. However, it can take a beating and still perform. Wood is the classic canoe look, but wood isn’t cheap and you wouldn’t want to take a wood canoe down a rocky river.

The lightest of all canoes are made of composite materials such as Kevlar or graphite. These feather-light canoes are the choice of competition and marathon canoe enthusiasts, as they can weigh 23 pounds for a solo canoe and 30 pounds for a tandem canoe.

A competition tandem canoe is 18 feet, 6 inches long and costs about $2,500, while a competition solo canoe can run the same length or six inches less and cost about the same. The one thing all competition canoes have in common is a balance of stiffness, strength and weight.

Typical construction of competition canoes include a rigid PVC structural-foam core laminated into the bilge and PVC-foam ribs laminated into the side to stiffen the hull. Many of these canoes have a foam-core that is the same type that is used in the aerospace industry. The hull is often vacuum-cured for a perfectly uniform lamination with a very high ratio of strength to weight. Sliding composite seats, adjustable foot braces, wood inwales and marine-anodized aircraft aluminum thwarts are usually standard. Speed is the primary objective of these canoes.

Finally, a discussion about canoes would be remiss if the subject of paddles was not mentioned, for it’s the human body that powers any canoe.

"We got into canoeing because hiking gave us blisters on our feet," Waring said. "Now we get blisters on our hands! But we can still cover a lot more distance with less effort."

Weight is the primary consideration for competition paddles; the lighter the paddle the less fatigue for the person doing the paddling. Your paddles should feel solid in the water, as well, as you pull through a stroke. Grip shape, shaft diameter and blade width help generate power and control. Competition paddles can be very expensive, so durability is another consideration. Carbonfiber and graphite combined with innovative lamination technology and advanced glues have improved durability.

For general recreation, a paddle with a soft T-grip or pear grip and a mid-sized or smaller blade is appropriate. You can find these paddles with a fiberglass or aluminum shaft with a stout plastic blade for a reasonable cost. You can also find some modestly priced wooden paddles. Heavier paddles will cost less, but just as with competition paddles, the lighter the paddle, the less fatigue for the person doing the paddling. Weight is an important consideration for canoe trippers who may be paddling for hours. A beavertail or tulip-shaped blade with a bit of flex will provide greater comfort over long trips. Fiberglass, synthetic composites or wood paddles with a 12-to-14-degree bent shaft are appropriate.

For whitewater canoeing, a T-grip with a broad rectangular or tulip blade and stiff shaft will provide the necessary power and control you need for navigating rapids. The best materials are fiberglass or laminated wood.