Okay, that's better.

On This past Sunday morning I was putting the finishing touches on the seats and perimeter lines to the North Star when I received a phone call from a friend at the state fish and game. They were looking for kayakers to scout the Pemigewasset River for a missing and presumed drowned individual who had fallen into the river early in the morning after a long night of heavy alcohol consumption. I told my friend "Of corpse I would." I initially thought "great" I will take the new boat, but then reconsidered because I had not had any shakedown in her and decided to take the Guillemot. I then spent the next six hours searching every tree trunk, rock, and snag on the east side of the river for 7 miles but no sign of him. After finishing our stretch of river we were told we could go home even though no body had been recovered or missing person heard from.

I went home and my son, Carl helped me put "Beluga" on the car and we headed to White Oak Pond for some paddling and photos. She is 18'3", weighs in at 37.5 lbs. (17Kg) She accommodates my son's size 14 feet. She is of northern white cedar hull, western red cedar deck, with birds eye maple veneer accents on the bow and stern decks. I was able to get her up to a sustained 7-7.3 mph (11 kph) over about 500 feet, with a comfortable cruising speed of 5 mph, as measured on my Garmin GPS 62.