Canoecopia 2019 Trip Report

Last weekend, I attended Canoecopia in Madison, Wisconsin. It’s the world’s largest paddlesports expo. I gave a couple of presentations. One on paddling the Lower Canyons of the Rio Grande River and the other on Photographing Seascapes. When I wasn’t giving presentations, I was in the Northstar Canoe booth helping out as a Northstar sponsored paddler. I did manage to walk part of the show, but not the entire show. When you know so many people in the industry, it is hard to make it from one side of the show to the other and up and down all the isles quickly. I wish I had gotten to spend a bit more time checking out all the new products, but it is what it is.

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The place I spent most of my time was in the Northstar Canoe booth. Northstar has a new canoe this year called a Firebird. It’s a smaller Phoenix coming in a 13’6″. There are three families of solo canoes from Northstar and the Phoenix and Firebird fall into the moving water, playful family. Personally, I like a canoe that maneuvers well, so I also use my Phoenix on flat water in the Boundary Waters.

Northstar is also offering a new layup. You can now add a ruby red or emerald green layer of fabric to the outside of the canoes instead of gelcoat. Gelcoat is dead! Hopefully, kayak manufacturers will figure that out soon. The ruby red on the Starlite layup absolutely glows and I have a ruby red starlite Firebird coming this summer. I can’t wait to photograph it.

Gelcoat is dead!

The stealth black carbon layup and the E6 carbon gunwales also stands out. Check out the all-but-the-logos-black canoe in the picture above. We tried to talk them into using black logos to murder that canoe out — crossing my fingers that that becomes an option.

If you are a Boundary Waters lover, how many times have you desired a wall-sized map for planning in your basement? For me, it’s all the time. The way you usually achieve it is by pasting a bunch of maps together. But, you don’t have to do that anymore. True North Map Company offers a 8’x3′ map made from Tyvek and you can get it coated to work with dry erase markers for planning trips. They also offer fabric maps which I’ll be reviewing in the near future.

It’s always nice to see friends volunteering at nonprofit booths. These folks don’t get paid to be there, so they should get some love. Here are two of my favorite groups in the Midwest working to promote safety, instruction and paddlesports. Thanks, Jeff and John!

One thing that surprised me more than anything is the price of kayaks these days. You can now pay $1500 for a sit-on-top kayak. Back in my retail days, we looked at sit-on-top kayaks as low-end, cheap things. Not anymore. And glass sea kayaks are running $4000. I hope someone picked up this show special Cetus for $2999. That’s a good deal these days.

One of my favorite boats of all times is the Dagger Meridian. I own two (and am probably going to sell one this spring). So, I have a place in my heart for Dagger. They were whitewater heavy with just a couple of touring kayaks. These are the Stratos model, which replaced the Alchemy — the last plastic boat I owned.

Wilderness Systems had a couple of changes (changes since last time I looked, which is a couple of years. Last I looked is when I owned a kayak guiding biz). I like the new Polaris. It looks like a nice tandem. These were the bread and butter boats for guiding out of when I had my biz. The other change is the new deck mess on the Tsunamis. The mesh deck bags will allow you to carry stuff on deck and I guess that’s what people want these days. At least, by using the mesh bags, they prevent a yard sale in the surf.

I really wanted to get into Kokopelli Packrafts booth and talk to them, but they were busy. I mean jam packed every time I walked by. I really want to try a packraft and combine it with the biking I do in Superior National Forest. I think there could be some really fun day trips to be had when using a raft and a bike.

Council Tool had a selection of quality Made in the USA axes at the show. It’s so hard to pass up a quality ax even if I seldom use them, except for splitting wood for heating our house. The one that I would love to take home is the Council Tool Wood-Craft Pack Axe with the 19-Inch handle. Ax lust going on here.

Subaru has done a good job of making its name one with the paddlesports industry. I bought a 2017 Subaru Outback because of their relationship with the ACA. But, the roof rack is terrible on the Outback. It would be much better just to put a set of Yakima Tracks on the car and call it good. The flexibility is increased and the wind profile drops when not using the rack. I looked into having a body shop remove my factory rack and putting on a set of Yakima Tracks and it was close to $1500 in work. The rack is so bad that I was tempted. Instead, I’m going to trade it in for a car that can take real racks. The new 2019 Toyota Rav4 looks pretty good in comparison. Just waiting to see how Yakima builds a rack to fit it.

Anyway, ending rant now.

Chesapeake Light Craft had their teardrop kit on display at the show. I so want one of these!

I wish I would have been able to walk the show a bit more and visit with other vendors and friends, but at least I was able to get around and see some of the show. If you came to one of my presentations or stopped by the booth, I want to say thanks!