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  1. #1
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
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    Texas
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    319

    Default rowing/camping in a Goat Island Skiff

    For those that plan to use your Goat for rowing and camping I have created this new thread to cover items that are specific to this type of use.

    My experience is based on a 97 mile rowing trip down the Colorado River here in Texas. From Bastrop to Columbus, Texas. This area is known for rice farming and cattle. This river has a few Class 1 rapids that are about as large as what your kids can create in the bath tub. It ranges in width from 50 feet to 60 yards. My guess it averages about 4 feet deep with a down stream current of about 1 mph.

    I was lucky that the river was a little above average water level for this time of year and rising due to all the rain we have had thanks to hurricane Alex.

    This trip was a test for a longer trip of an additional 130 miles thru an area of Texas that is a little more remote and has a few portages all the way to the Gulf of Mexico.

    If you plan to use your GIS for long distance rowing, DO IT! I had a great time.

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  3. #2
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    'Delaide, Australia
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    Can I copy your text of the rowing trip from the Texas200 forum to here?

    It has some interesting observations.

    MIK

  4. #3
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Location
    Texas
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    Default

    Quote Originally Posted by Boatmik View Post
    Can I copy your text of the rowing trip from the Texas200 forum to here?

    It has some interesting observations.

    MIK
    Mik,

    That would be fine.

  5. #4
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
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    'Delaide, Australia
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    65
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    John's trip from another forum in cyberspace

    My wife dropped me in at Bastrop, Texas on the Colorado River. Rowed 97 miles over 3 nights and got out a Columbus, Texas before the first portage. My portage cart would not work on a practice portage I tried along the way. My Goat is just too clumsy on land and I needed some much larger balloon style wheels or an anti-gravity machine to make it thru the mud . With all the rain I had there would be no way for me to haul the boat up any slope covered in mud. The Colorado River has plenty of mud along it's banks which is made worse by all the cow poo. Lots of cow poo.

    I carried only the mizzen with me as a sail to help steady the boat and keep the nose pointed into the wind. Of course the wind was always on the nose. I built a short daggerboard and used my normal rudder to act as a skeg. This arrangement worked very well. One of the reasons I pulled out before the first portage was I was finding it hard to keep the rain water out of the boat. Over night I had what seemed like 5 inches of water inside the boat from an all night rain storm. (I camped on the sand bars) After a morning bailing, I watched the boat slowly fill up as it poured down in buckets during the day. I arranged my sun awnings to cover up about 2/3 of the boat and that helped slow the amount of time needed to bail. It also gave me enough shelter to allow me to nap during the worst of the storm while pulled up on a sand bar. The river was rising and there was a flash flood watch for the area so I called it a day.

    I had a good time and enjoyed the solitude. Learned a lot and have a few new idea's that I will have to work on to make the boat more serviceable for long distance travel.

    Still like my Goat.

    John

    PS. None of the dams are on public roads so I have to do far more research to see if the can be portaged with a large boat. The LCRA, (Lower Colorado River Authority) says all but one can be portaged, at this point I do not think it can be done with a Goat. The other dam is now protected by Home Land Security because it's the water source for the South Texas Nuclear Power Plant. Go figure?

  6. #5
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Location
    Texas
    Posts
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    The picture here is of the rowing daggerboard , the green one, I made compared to the sailing daggerboard for my GIS. The rudder is on the far left.
    I did not want to carry the taller daggerboard and bang it up on my rowing trip, so I quickly made the rowing daggerboard out of 2 layers of ¾” plywood. I started with (2) 24”x24” boards, traced the original daggerboards profile onto the boards. Then cut out the 2 sides and used epoxy to glue it together. My planer has a width of 13” and that is what determined the width of the rowing foil. I didn’t want to hand plane the whole shape so I used the planer and a belt sander. It shaped very quickly. Applied 2 coats of epoxy with some fairing compound mixed in. The odd green tint is because I started to paint it then decided it would take too long for the paint to dry so I wiped it all off. The paint stained the fairing compound and gave the board that transparent green tint.
    I used my standard rudder. The blue tape is to highlight the 12” mark we put on the rudder. It indicates that there is 12“of rudder in the water. We did the same for the real daggerboard as you can see. I think I will make a shorter rowing rudder as a winter project, mainly to preserve my good sailing rudder.

    Overall this arrangement worked well for rowing. The river I was on was very windy with lots of bends so the wind came from all directions. The only reason I raised the foils was to clear shallow water, but I think the amount of the foils sticking down in the water was more than enough to make the GIS stable in windy conditions. When I did lift the boards up I could turn the boat much easier, but I did not ever feel I was out of control with only 12” of rudder and 9” of daggerboard.

  7. #6
    Join Date
    Jul 2005
    Location
    'Delaide, Australia
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    65
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    Default

    Good info John,

    Nice to have the sizing that is known to work.

    MIK

  8. #7
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Location
    Texas
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    Default

    There are a few Class 1 rapids on the Colorado River. They have gentle long drops, shallow, fast moving water and small rocks. In other words I think we all have sailed in bigger waves. The other big danger is “sweepers”. A sweeper is any low hanging branch or tree that drags in the river.

    The GIS is designed to row facing the rear of the boat. For the long haul this works great, but on tight curves, rapids and dodging sweepers I liked to face forward. I would turn the boat around with the stern going first. It proved to be very noisy and a few times the transom would catch a wave (maybe 6” tall) and slam to a stop. When running rapids I liked to face forward with the bow facing downstream. I found sitting on my ice chest as an extra seat just in front of bulkhead #4, facing forward worked well, but the tiller was just long enough to poke me in the back all the time. I have thought of cutting 4 inches of the tiller so that it is flush with bulkhead #4. Not too sure if I want to do it.

    I rigged some temporary oar locks about 12” in front of the middle seat using the Phil Bolger bolt & strap design and an aluminum angle. This was bolted thru the inwale spacers. This allowed me to face forward while sitting on the middle seat and have the pointy end of the boat face downstream. If my 5 gallon water supply was not in the front cockpit this oar lock position seemed to work well. With the extra water up front the weight pushed the bow down and made it harder to turn the boat. The boat would turn around the bow, but not pivot on the daggerboard. The other problem was the daggerboard sticking up between my legs. Not really a problem when the board was completely down, but if the board was raised up a little my stomach would touch it during a hard push of the oars. If I did not have the short rowing daggerboard it would be a bigger problem with the standard sized board.

    My second temporary oar lock location I tried was just above bulkhead #3 on the back edge of the middle seat. This required me to sit on my ice chest, facing forward, but it kept me far enough away from the tiller that it did not poke me in the back. This was not a strong rowing position because I could not lean into the oars without knocking my knees into the middle seat.

    The forward facing positions I tried were not strong or positions that I would consider comfortable for long periods of time. They put a lot of joint compression discomfort in my wrists, but I liked that I could see where I was going and not have to look over my shoulder all the time.

    During this trip I did add a good number of scrapes and a few deep scares to the chines and runners, but the hull itself was not damaged. I was amazed how little damage there was because from the inside the boat the noises it makes while running aground are just awful. Remember how noisy the hull is when you sanded the inside, its worst when you grind your beautifully finished hull over a rock or oyster reef.
    Last edited by john goodman; 6th August 2010 at 11:15 AM. Reason: text too small

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