A Stable Sail Powered Fishing Platform
I started out in plywood canoes at around the age of 12 on scout camping trips. I got a good grounding in canoe safety and paddling techniques while I was in the scouts. Although my favourite type of fishing was rockhopping, fishing and paddling always appealed to me, I bought my first roto-moulded kayak when I was a young apprentice with some disposable income.
A lot has changed in kayak fishing since then and now the SOT (sit on top) type kayak is king. Doing my research online and and watching the great video's about kayak fishing particularly those posted by Josh at Yakass.net had me convinced I'd really like to get my hands on a sailing kayak. My budget was only $1,500 so I wasn't having much joy...
I finally got lucky, I won an Ebay auction for a Windrider 10 sailing trimaran kayak. The pickup was in Albury and $1550 secured the Windrider 10, A quality paddle, a custom road trailer and a spare sail. So after a cool roadtrip and a couple of days back at home in Broken Hill waiting for the right wind and weather conditions we finally got the chance to take the kayak up to Lake Pamamaroo in the Menindee Lakes for a test sail.
I'm fairly happy with the sailability of the Windrider 10. I am super impressed with the stability once the outriggers are fitted and I was very happy with how it paddles sans sail. The sail will require some minor repairs but the guy I bought the kayak from chucked in a spare sail so I have only to do the cutting and sewing to sort things out. Now I have a great deal of work ahead of me pimping my new ride to set it up for fishing. But the guys at Yakass and another good kayak fishing site Australian Kayak Fishing Forum have already covered a lot of that ground so I'll be following the advice and ideas posted on these great forums mostly.
Of particular interest is the post my brother made about doing up his own fishing kayak: Pimping a kingfisher kayak.
Here is the Windrider 10 also known as the Windrider Tango all packed up on it's custom trailer. The mast and sail are up on the roof of my Landrover Defender 130. The trailer is very sturdy and it survived a serious torture test coming back from Albury where I went to buy it. Between Ivanhoe and Menindee there is 200km of road comprising bulldust, sand, gravel and black river clay. This road is heavily corrugated and rutted and makes for a great load and trailer test track for anyone serious about outback travel off the bitumen. As I always remind my readers, always carry ample water, fuel, spares, tools and food when driving the remote outback tracks.
Here is the young bloke learning a bit about paddling and getting comfortable with the seating position and the rudder foot pedal steering mechanism. Not long after I took this photo I explained to him that he would have to practice capsizing and recovery drills next, his big smile turned into a big frown fairly quick...
Having passed his recovery drill and rescued the kayak, righting it and reboarding properly I went and got the Amas or outrigger pontoons and fitted them to the kayak. The outriggers turn this small vessel into a super stable platform and standing up on board to fish is perfectly possible without worrying about flipping over. Being so low to the surface of the water means a double dose of UV rays from the surface reflection so some serious sun protection will be in order for all day fishing. We both got a bit sunburned this day even though it was hazy and overcast much of the time.
Later in the afternoon the wind picked up a fair bit and I put on a PFD and took the Windrider 10 out and pushed it pretty hard in winds around 20kmh with gusts up around 35kmh. I could not tip it over even when I got silly deliberatly running hard sheeted perpendicular to the wind and the rigging, rudder and outriggers stood up to this initial stress testing without any drama at all. I managed to lift the windward Ama completely clear of the water and very nearly buried the lee Ama a few times. The craft never felt like pitch poling which is something I've managed to do with Hobie 14 and 16 catamarans on several occasions. The asymetrical shape and the forward positioning of the Amas seems to make this sailing kayak close to perfect in terms of stability under sail. I'm toying with the idea of modifying the sail to roller furl on the fly, adding a furling genoa and installing trapeze platforms to either side, that would put the stabiltiy of this design to the test.
The 2010 price for a new Windrider Tango was $3,000 dollars US. So I'm guessing around that mark plus freight will get you one if you were keen, but go take a look at the Windrider website for information on the Tangoes bigger brothers, the 16, the two person 17 and the incredible hydrofoil trimaran the Rave. I'll buy a 17 before I buy a Hobie Catamaran for sure if I ever win Lotto... http://www.windrider.com/windridertango.aspx
Yes, we did do a bit of fishing while we were there. I never go near water without trying for a fish. The Carp got a hiding this day. The young bloke got 10 and the biggest and I managed 8. We only saw four vehicles on the road to the weir and a dozen people the whole day which is considered crowded by Menindee Lakes standards. The fishing inspector showed up later in the day which was a real surprise, I've never seen an inland fishing inspector on any NSW freshwater before but as always I had my licence with me and we were following the rules so there were no dramas. The Fisho was more interested in the Windrider than the opera house bait nets we had and he didn't even look in our big camp esky to see if we had undersized fish or more than our bag limit of Golden Perch or Murray Cod. I'd told him we had caught nothing but Carp that day and he just took me for my word which was pretty decent of him.
