Well that was interesting

Warm weather here and I took Duh!k to the lake.

Wind was up and that was not a problem with the Carolina, but Duh!k is quite a bit ‘tippier’.

I was using my wider blades and should a switched out when the wind picked up. Live and learn. Yup, I capsized. Blade up, wind gust hit me and over I went. Happened so fast I didn’t even realize it until I was under water. Full wetsuit on, so water, while cold, was not an issue. I was not tossed out of the cockpit like I would have been if I’d been in the Carolina, but had to do a wet exit as I was not calm by any means: my brain went into panic mode and I could not get my ass sorted out to even attempt a roll up.

I’d have posted about it sooner, but my phone is at the bottom of the lake🤬. I thought it was secure, lol. Had to buy a new phone and go through the hoops to get it set up with my number. Done and done, still moving into this one.

Anywhoos, once free of the duh!k, my mind cleared up, I relaxed and decided to swim and tow back to shore. Just didn’t even want to attempt a cowboy recovery in 300′ deep water, and it was only 100 yards or so to shore (that’s when I realized the phone had deeped on me) so, slide the paddle into the boat, grab a handle and back stroke with her in tow.

Pluses: wet suit works awesome, never felt the least bit chilled, even after getting to shore with the wind blowing.

The combination of suit(wetsuits add to flotation, divers have to use weights to counteract that.)and PFD really made swimming easy, and getting a grip on my panic even easier.

My confidence in the Duh!k, counter intuitively, is better. I now know where that tippiness becomes roll. And it’s a lot further over than I thought. I know I don’t have to clinch my knees up to stay in tight, so I can be a little more relaxed (and less likely to tense up, which is what really capsized me, the wind just kicked it off.)

And I really learned how to get the water out of the boat. That’s harder than you’d think, but not so bad if you can rock the boat on a pivot point. (Point in this case was a half sunk log near shore.) A boat holds a lot of water and water starts weighing in fast. I really need to get my float bags and bilge pump soon. Those would help and a water recovery would have been more of an option.

Interesting and educational in a way a book could never be.

Now if I could find someone as nutty as me willing to learn the same things I want to learn, we could buddy up and,,,