René Seindal

A bit delayed, as is normal and indeed expected here in Italy, I’ve arrived here at the Capalonga Camping for the first Bibione Kayak Symposium. It was a 90km drive from Venice, with side bags on the motorcycle, the tent and a split paddle on the back seat. The only noteworthy event of the drive were at Bibione where they had little signs along the road saying: “Beware! Crossing squirrels”.

My main purpose here is to get to known all the important people from the Italian kayaking world. Sea kayaking is not a big sport in Italy, at least not yet, so it shouldn’t be an entirely unrealistic goal.

I’ve been writing a bit with the people of Sea Kayak Design, as they’re supporting our Venetian kayak venture with kayaks at cost price, and today I finally met Giuseppe, Rino and Raymond in person. They have some very nice, well designed and well built kayaks that I’m really looking forward to trying. That’s one of the things on my agenda for tomorrow.

Sea Kayak Design wants to emphasize on build quality rather than on quantity. They kayaks I saw today were certainly of impeccable craftmanship, but the real test will be if orders come in faster than they can keep up with. Good thing than Venice Kayak will get some of the early one. Venice Kayak will work as a test center for Sea Kayak Design, so drop by and give them a try one day.

The special guest here at Bibione are Nigel Foster, Kristin Nelson and Jen Kleck. I had the fortune to paddle part of this year’s Vogalonga with them. They’re doing classes here each day, but since most participants will only show up in the weekend, the classes haven’t been very booked. So much the better for those of us who are here before the weekend, so I have signed up for a morning class with Jen and an afternoon with Nigel and Kristin. I believe that we will only be a handful at most.

Nicola de Florio from Avatak Pagaie is also here. Its been quite a while, so its been great seeing him again.

Many Italian paddlers seem to know me now, even if I don’t know them yet. Partly because of the spactacular failure last year with the circumnavigation of Sardinia, partly because it doesn’t happen every day that a Dane not only gets the silly idea of organising paddling tours of Venice, but actually tries to do it. I guess it also helps that the sea kayaking world in Italy is of limited size.-

I still haven’t any squirrels around here.

Sunday was Vogalonga Day and all of Venice was turned upside down for a day.

The Vogalonga is a celebration of Venice and its rowing traditions, and in part also a protest against the invasion of the city by motorised vessels. The waves made by motorboats and ferries are very harmful to both city and lagoon.

There must have been close to 1600 boats this year, a bit more than last year. The highest number I saw was 1566. On top of the registered boats there are all those who just come along—like my friend Marco who has done it so many times he doesn’t care about the diploma anymore—so the total number of participating boats could be anything from 1600 to 2000. The number of persons participating must be many times higher, as a lot of boats had a crew of more than one.

Most of the locals row traditional boats. Many are from the various rowing associations, but there are a lot of private boats too. There were many gondolas, of course, but I think the most popular type must be the sandalo, and the smaller sandalino. The sandalo is a very elegant boat, long and slender with much less rocker than a gondola. Besides these I saw Mascherete, Topi, Tope and a huge Peata.

Personally I must have been one of the slowest of the many participants. I came in just minutes before the closed the finishing line down.

We started from the Camping San Nicolò on the Lido. I was up at 6.30 to get everything ready, so we could be in St. Mark’s Basin at 8.30. It’s only a 30 minutes paddle, but there are always things to do, and we had a group of some 12-14 persons to get on the water. Our launching conditions at the camping aren’t finished yet, and the very low tide caused a bit of problems, but we found various corners and ramps to launch from.

We paddled to St. Mark’s Basin in a loose group and soon got separated in the confusion. I followed Marco in the hope of getting to meet some of his Italian paddling friends, and we did meet up with Giorgio Sartori who is organising the Bibione Kayak Symposium in these days, some 70km north of Venice. Giorgio was in good company, with Nigel Foster, Kerstin Nelson and Jen Kleck.

I quickly lost track of where Marco went, and instead I paddled with Giorgio, Nigel, Kerstin and Jen for most of the first half of the Vogalonga. We paddled with the main group, and it was quite a spectacle with a plethora of different boats.

A beautiful blu-white Topa which had been built by hand by the crew themselves.

A vintage sandalino, made in 1968, rowed “alla valesiana” with two oars crossed.

A Peata, an old type of cargo boat.

This is by far the most beautiful boat I saw all day. A beautiful sandalo with a beautiful crew in beautiful clothes, they did draw both attention and camera lenses.

Burano is a fascinating place, so we stopped there to have a look at the city with all the coloured houses, and there suddenly, Marco showed up again, with a couple of girls, naturally. To show off I guess, he started crawling around on the kayaks. The water in that canal is absolutely disgusting, so I had my camera ready should he end in the water, but alas, nothing happened.

We had a nice break there for a bit of sightseeing and a coffee. We continued, now way behind the main group of boats. I chatted with Marco for a while, and lost contact with Jen, Nigel and Kristin there. I tried to catch up with them on the stretch from Mazzorba to Murano, but only managed to work up a sweat. When I got to Canal Grande in Murano they were nowhere to be seen.

There were very few boats out in the lagoon at this point, so I knew I was quite a bit behind the majority of the boats, so it was quite a surprise to find the Cannaregio canal totally and utterly crowded. I had seen on the description of the route that the Ponte Tre Archi was a known congestion point, but didn’t really expect any congestion being so late.

Most of the trafic jam was caused by backwards rowers, English style rowing they call it here. There was quite a bit of current in the canal, so when the long boats tried to negotiate the narrow bridge arch they easily got turned sideways blocking the bridge. I moved forward to the bridge just as two backwards boats tried to do the same, and got squeezed between the oars of the two. It was a bit like being stuck between two giant combs with moving teeth. I got out of the problem by pulling myself close to one of the boats under their oars, so the other could get through first, then I followed before the second backwards boat.

Just behind the Ponte Tre Archi I found Jen Kleck, clinging on to a parked motorboat, looking like a lost puppy. In the mess before the bridge she had gotten separated from Nigel and Kristin, and didn’t know whether they were ahead or behind. We paddled together down the Cannaregio to the Canal Grande towards the finishing line.

As we neared the finishing line, Jen wanted to see a bit of the smaller canals, so we made a short detour down the Rio della Toletta, Rio del Malpaga, Rio del’Avogario to the Squero Tramontin and along the Rio dei Ognisanti to the Rio di San Trovaso and back to the Canal Grande.

It was a pretty detour, but we lost more time, and as we finally came back to the St. Mark’s basin the loudspeakers went “and thanks to all our sponsors for their support …”, and I was quite sure we’d managed to be too late my a split second, but as we passed the finishing line we got out little diploma and medal.

We ran into Marco again there, sitting in his kayak behind a couple of wooden poles, chatting to somebody on his mobile phone. Jen was quickly reacquiring her lost puppy look, so Marco rang Giorgio to find out where the others were. They were already at the car near the barrier, and after a bit of discussion of routes and canals, it was decided that Marco and I would escort Jen back there through the city.

Once Jen was back in safety, we paddled back to the Lido north of the city, to avoid all the confusion and have a bit of quiet around us for a change. At least I was rather tired. The approximately 30km of the Vogalonga had turned into 40-45km in all, and I really wanted to stand up and stretch my legs.

Just as we were about getting the kayaks up, meeting the others, and I started to think about showers and sleeping bags, Marco threw another bomb. It was suddenly his birthday too, so we all had to go out and eat together. Bye bye sleeping bag. Nevertheless, we had a nice evening at the pizzeria “Alla Botte” in Gran Viale on the Lido, but I was practically sleep walking back to the camping afterwards.

More Vogalonga photos on Flickr.

Tomorrow is Vogalonga day, and we’re on our way to bed so we can get up in time for the start at 9 in the St. Mark’s basin.

Today we’ve had a group of Vogalonga participants on a tour on Venice in kayak. We were three Sardinians, three from Puglia, one from Bologna, four Frenchmen and a lone Englishman, plus a Dane and a Venetian.

We had no specific plan, other than paddling around the city enjoying the scenery.

This time we managed to paddle all the way through the Arsenal. Its still a closed military area, though it is full of non military activities, so you can get in legally on foot, but not in a boat. We took the chance, and only at the very exit were we told to leave.

We then had a close encounter with a vaporetto in the St. Mark’s basin, which almost ended a couple of participants in the water, but we got by safely all of us.

We then spend several hours paddling around in the area of St. Mark’s, San Polo, Dorsoduro and Cannaregio. We had lunch near Piazza San Barnabá.

The city is full of weird boats, from kayaks to huge canoes to polynesian canoes and many other water crafts I don’t know the name of.

On our way back we paddled north of the city back to the Arsenale, around Certosa and back to the camping on the Lido.

I have many photos but I’m too tired to upload them now.
More photos on Flickr.

Here’s a few photos from the Camping San Nicolò this afternoon as the participants of this years Vogalonga started settling in.

My blogging is way behind schedule. My last post is one week and 2000 km old. Right now I’m sitting on the ferry boat from Venice to the Lido, as part of the weekends move from Mestre to the Lido.

Tomorrow we’re organising a tour of the city for the guests we have for the Vogalonga. Many will come to Venice just for a prolonged weekend, so Saturday is their only chance to see a bit of the city.

Sunday is the day of the Vogalonga. I’m not quite sure how the number inscriptions, but my number could either mean that there are some 1200 registered before me, or that there are the same amount of foreign boats registered, that is, not counting the Italian boats.

Right now we’re collecting the last bits and pieces of equipment in the Camping San Nicolò which is our paddling base here in Venice.

Today we’ve taken delivery of a kayak from Nautico Mannino in Catania and I’ve been to Treviso to pick up life vests and spraydecks, while Marco has taken three kayaks and a bunch of other stuff to the Lido. He’s also been making laminated maps of the city and the lagoon.

We’re still some gear short, so we’ve been borrowing a bit to get ends to meet.

It is almost impossible to get “normal” paddles here in Italy, at least in the price range we’re looking for. Practically all cheap paddles here are feathered by 80°-90° which is way too much for my taste. I don’t want our guests coming home with wrist injuries. In the end I had to ask the shop to take some less extremely feathered paddles home just for us. We won’t get them for a few weeks, though.

We’re getting close to the Lido now, so I better leave the bar and get down to the motorcycle.

Today I kept the appointment I missed last week. I’ve been to Stockholm again to meet Carin and Lars from Horisont Kajak.

Horisont Kajak does coaching and excursions in the skerries around Stockholm. They are far from the largest kayak business in the Stockholm area, but no doubt one of the most dedicated and active.

Their base is on the Värmdö island, about 30km outside the city centre, at water’s edge in a forest, surrounded by a golf course. I don’t know if they have some golf/kayak packages, but they could have It is a staggeringly beautiful setting for a kayak activity.

After a bit of a mixup, due to the fact that Stockholm Central has two taxi pick up points, I finally met Carin in person. Initially I thought we were going to Värmdö, but after walking for a while I understood that we were going to stay in Stockholm city.

Swedish and Danish are sibling languages, but like siblings they can sometimes disagree violently. The phonetics differ quite a bit, and there are traps in the vocabulary too. The word “roligt”, for example, means “funny” in Swedish but “calm” in Danish. In Danish “taske” is a bag, but it means “whore” in Swedish. A bag in Swedish is “väska” which is a liquid in Danish. The list could go on, but nevertheless we can understand each other with a little care. The languages are close enough to make it feel like a defeat having to switch to English to communicate.

Back to Carin in Stockholm. We had a very nice walk down the edge of a bay, where we first stopped for a coffee, then continued down to a public park. There is water all over in Stockholm, as the city has grown over the skerries from one little island to the next. Its often called the Venice of Scandinavia for this.

After a while Lars, the other half of Horisont Kajak, met us for lunch. He looked distinctly non-kayaky, dressed in a jacket and a tie. I guess that is the curse of a day job

Lunch was great, but got cold on me as Carin and Lars kept me talking about Venice Kayak instead of letting me eat. After much talking, pondering spreadsheets and photos, we agreed that we can work together. Hopefully Lars and Carin can find the time for a short visit to Venice soon, so they can see for themselves what we have to offer.

I’m now on my way home from Stockholm. Tomorrow is for packing and last minute preparations, and on Thursday Valentina and I are off on the motorcycle towards Venice where we’ll arrive on Friday in time for the Festa della Sensa.

I’m heading back to Stockholm on Tuesday for a short visit to Horisont Kajak. I was supposed to meet with Carin and Lars on last Thursday, but failed to make it within the time constraints I was travelling under. Now I’ll try to make up for it.

Since I’m leaving for Italy on May 1st, there’s no time to fool around with the motorcycle this time.

I’ve spend most of the last days roaming parts of southern and central Sweden. All in all I did some 1500 km in three days, but only managed to keep two of my three appointments.

On Wednesday I drove from Copenhagen to Gothenburg to visit my friends Sara, Johan and Elda at Escape Kajakcenter. The journey up there was event-less, with motorway all the way, except for a few minor mishaps on the ring road of Gothenburg, but nothing the GPS of my phone couldn’t handle. I got there in the end and that is what matters.

The scope of the visit was to present my Venice Kayak project to Sara and Johan, in the hope that they would want to organise some tours down there for their customers. We had a very nice evening, eating sushi, and talking kayaking and Venice. I’m very happy that Sara and Johan liked my ideas and hence Escape Kajakcenter will try to organise a couple of groups to send to Venice in August and September this year.

The next day, Thursday, I continued towards Stockholm after another quick visit at Escape Kajakcenter to pick up a few things. I expected it to be just as easy as the day before, only an hour longer due to the distance, but as I continued on the E20 I discovered that most of the road between Gothenborg and Stockholm isn’t motorway. In the end it took well over six hours to get there.

My first appointment in Stockholm was with Paul Rosenquist from Point 65°N. We’ve been writing together for a while regarding kayaks for Venice, and as I was going to Stockholm anyway, and it was mostly on the road, we’d make an agreement to meet.

Point 65°N has their headquarters in a small house on the Pampas Marina in Stockholm. At first it seemed like such a little house for an company the size of Point 65°N, and inside people were almost sitting on top of each other, so they probably have something bigger next year if they continue to grow at the same rate.

Just besides the offices is Pampas Kajak, the largest kajak store in Sweden. It is owned by the same group that owns Point 65°N, and, lo and behold, mostly sold Point 65°N kayaks.

Paul promised me he’d do everything possible to get one of the first of Nigel Foster’s Whiskey 16 kayak to Venice for us. It does look like a fantastic boat, and I really can’t wait to try it.

My last appointment was with Carin and Lars at Horisont Kajak just outside Stockholm. It was getting late and I hurried as much as I could, following the driving indications I had saved from Horisont Kajak’s homepage. They were very precise and I arrived reasonably quickly at their base. Horisont Kajak is located in the most beautiful of places, in the middle of a forest down to a sheltered corner of the Stockholm archipelago. Too bad nobody was there. I wasn’t really surprised, though, because it was a bit late, so I set out to find the home address of Carin and Lars.

This time the GPS in my phone failed me completely. It quickly gave me a route to follow, which I did. Unfortunately the navigation software didn’t distinguish properly between real roads suitable for a 300kg motorcycle with driver and luggage, and muddy hiking paths in the local forest, so I ended up somewhere completely weird and certainly not correct. A rather scared looking lady with two small dogs certainly didn’t expect to meet a fully loaded motorcycle in there. After about half an hour driving around in the little forested residential neighbourhood I had ended in, I finally managed to extricate myself from the maze of playing children, seniors taking an evening stroll and assorted joggers, by doing the exact opposite of what the nice lady from the navigation company told me.

When I finally returned to the main road, and found a route suitable for motorcycles leading to Gustavsberg, the nice lady fell silent. When I stopped to check the phone, it was dead, out of battery.

I know Carin and Lars lives near Gustavsberg, on a small road somewhere on the outskirts of town, or so it seems on the maps I consulted before I left home, but without a GPS, without a working phone, with a non-working phone number to call, it just disconnected when I tried to call, and with all shops closed, I couldn’t really get any further.

Staying the night in Stockholm and trying to sort out the situation the next day wasn’t really a possibility, as I also had an appointment in Copenhagen at two on Friday, with some eight hours driving to do, so after pondering the situation I decided I could just as well start returning home, and I headed back to the Stockholm ring road and the motorway home.

It soon got too cold to continue, and after a few hours I stopped and looked for a place to sleep. I was fortunate enough to find a youth hostel just minutes before they closed for the evening, and got a good nights sleep. In the morning I was back on the motorway heading for Copenhagen. I was driving too fast because I wanted to keep my appointment in Copenhagen at two, and I almost got stopped by the police for speeding. I spotted the police car just in time to slow down so it looked like I had been overtaking rather than just speeding, and the police car quit following me after a few minutes.

In any case, I did make my appointment, arriving at three to two.

Ever thought about going paddling in Venice? Paddling down the Canale Grande, under the Rialto Bridge, through all the small obscure little canals, dodging gondolas along the way?

Very soon it will be possible.

Marco Ballarin and myself are about to open Venice Kayak , where we’ll organise guided tours in kayak in Venice and in the lagoon. We’ll be based on the Lido, less than 30 minutes paddle from St. Mark’s, within walking distance of the beach and all the amenities of the Lido.

We hope to be ready and operational in May. Our website is at www.venicekayak.com.