Organic Kayaks

I thought you guys might find this interesting.  This is a picture I took in Northern Peru about 1984 in a little town called Huanchaco.  These guys build these things out of Thule type reeds that they grow in little sinkholes on the outskirts of town.  They fished out of them daily, and they could even surf them too.  One guy let me paddle one around and it worked pretty well.  As I remember though, they only used single bladed paddles.

x-tra cool    I keep talking about building a cardboard yak this summer...Leah keeps talking about me finishing the re-model!

Here's the hi-tech factory

Very cool.  Again, it goes to prove that although kayak fishing may be new to many of us... other cultures have been doing for long, long time.

Pescadore, did those things have self draining scupper holes or slits? 

The paddle they used are a large piece of bamboo split in half.  It is paddled like a kayak.

-Allen

Allen's right.  I couldn't really remember what they used for a paddle.  I also don't really remember if they had anything like a drain slit.  I think they sat or kneeled on the pontoon part and kept gear in the back.  And I think the back compartment was somewhat awash.  I do know that they used them till they were waterlogged, then just made another.  Here's another pic:

This proves beyond a doubt that bluekayak is a total wimp paddling his new fangled plastic kayak! 

You know I love you blue but I have to give you crap  I am sure that don't actually catch fish with these since they don't have fishfinders.

Actually Bill, they do fish out of them. Notice  that the fellow is working on nets in the picture.
I've seen these people and their crafts on the Discovery Channel. what they can do in them make us all
look like wimps. Hey Bluekayak when you build your yak, don't forget  to include a spot for the crate in the design.

And if I remember right, you kneel in the front.  The rear is for storage.  Some people stand on them.

-Allen

I was curious if they still fished that way in Huanchaco.  Twenty years is a while.  So I punched in Huanchaco Peru into my browser and a lot of stuff came up.  The first site was a buch of great pics from 2003:  http://www.pbase.com/patrickm/huanchaco_peru  The thing that I'm blown away by is how much the town has become a resort.  When we were there there wasn't any grass or pavement.  It was just a little fishing town in the edge of a big, very bleak desert with a little local tourism.  If I can do this right, check out this picture of a guy surfing one of these boats from the site:   The cool part of all this is that they're still fishing this way boosted by tourist bucks.  Also, they generally fish gill nets (as I remember, again).

Maybe someone can start making these "Caballitos" here.  It appeal to the organic crowd.  Recyclable sit on tops.

Beautiful pics!!!