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BY: CORRAN ADDISON
PHOTOS:
Corran Addison,
Christine Pinsonneault,
Jed Weingarten &
Will Mattos
Bio
Corran Addison is a regular contributor to the Paddler magazine and owns Soul Waterman
The creek boat quandary
When I first got to Perception kayaks in 1987, I proposed a new boat design that I’d done in South Africa. A shorter, wider kayak with more rocker would allow me to run harder rivers with greater ease. The owner Bill Masters was sceptical that this design would make paddling easier for everyone. After we paddled a class 3 river together, he said to me, “You could paddle a log down here, and it wouldn’t make any difference to you, but is this the kind of boat that everyone else needs?” I was convinced it was. That boat became the Corsica, and it changed paddling in North America.
There seems to be a new split in the world of creek boat design. It’s a bit of a read, so ponder this while you sip your morning coffee (instead of perusing TikTok videos).
For a while, things seemed to settle into a homogenous alignment of thought where all boats were the same: 9’ long, super rocker, super volume skip machines.
Running alongside those was the new half slice evolution. Those same 9’ (275cm) creek boat designs (often, in fact, the same hull mould) with the same huge volume bow were given a super slice tail.
There were some outliers, of course. Only 3-4 years old, the Soul Chaos Monkey is 9’6”, and the Funky Monkey is 9’10”. The Liquid Logic Delta V is 8’6”. The Waka Tutea is 8’2”. But for about half a decade, 9’ has been this magic number that most creek boats (and half slices) were conforming to.
This outlier list came out right as the mega rocker trend was starting; since these new rockers, boats have gotten longer (but with the same waterline length as before), with many new ones generally ranging from 9’ to 9’6” (and a few approaching 10’).
There are sound arguments for these shapes and lengths.I was one of the proponents pushing for more length in creek boats. In many situations, they work well. When you’re just hanging on, as you careen down some massive volume ‘out of control’ flush flume, it’s nice to have all that length and volume.
Now you have some interesting fusions between the half slice and creek boats. The two most notable are the Waka Puffy Steeze and Goat (though the LL Remix and Soul Gonzo started to explore this concept): These are not half slices, as you’re not sauntering your way down the river stern squirting everywhere – they’re too big in the tail for actual squirting to be easy enough to be much fun. But they are decidedly lower volume tails so that the tail can be ‘pivot turned’ – especially as you eject from a feature.
‘Friendsville Five’
Pivotable tails on fat bows are not new, of course. The ‘Friendsville Five’ explored these ideas in the late 1980s. The Savage Gravity had a non-squirtable but pivotable tail, and the Riot Hammer, while lacking the benefits of modern rockers and sufficient bow volume, had a tail that was just pivotable enough to get me out of many a scary spot because I could dip and whip.
But with the half slice evolution has come a new exploration of tapping into currents below the surface in a creek environment. I believe there is a future here, not as something only accessible by the pros but for the general paddling public.
Then there are boats like the Wave Sport Phoenix with a tail so short and rockered that you can turn it ‘on the tail’ like you’re pivoting it without ever dipping it. An interesting idea. At a glance, the Nirvana was also exploring this concept. The result of these two designs is very long bows, designed to hit the ‘magic 9’ mark’. Those long bows seem unnecessary to me – like they would have been shorter if ‘race length’ wasn’t 9’. That’s a lot of flapping bow out there.
Would ‘pivotable’ (not half slice squirtable, but pivotable) designs be the future in creek boats? One of several futures, possibly.
This is why I said in my opening salvo that there appears to be a split happening: this exploration into turning the boat like you’re in a half slice, without being in a half slice, seems to be something that might catch on. It works, especially if you tend to paddle a half slice or full slice boat most of the time, and sometimes you need a safer creek boat that handles in a way you’re familiar with. I’m certainly more comfortable on a challenging river in a boat that I can paddle in a familiar way: using the water above and below the surface for my control.
Now you might wonder why I’m pondering what could work for ‘your average paddler’.
Joe Paddler challenges
Sadly, I’m not just past my prime; I’m well past it. I also succumbed to vestibular neuritis in the late winter of 2022 (a condition that has you in a state of constant vertigo). As a result, I’m a far cry from the paddler I used to be. The challenges that Joe Paddler faces each time they go out are now the same ones that I face; you’ve seen that hesitant, stuttered paddling from someone that looks out of their comfort zone. Yeah, well, that’s now me.
However, I still try to hang with the young guns sometimes. And my eight-year-old is developing into quite the paddler, so that he will be pushing me in just a couple of years.
What I’m finding is I’m having a harder time adjusting to ‘unfamiliar’ designs: that no matter how suited a design might be for the task at hand, if the boat paddles in a way that’s different from my ‘everyday’ boat, I struggle. In my case, my everyday boat is a short sub 8’ planning hulled ¾ slice: the Glide. Despite my years and medical condition, I can paddle this boat effortlessly, making few errors. But it’s simply too low volume (both bow and tail) and lacks the modern creek rockers to take it anywhere near class 5.
displacement
For years I’ve been an advocate of ‘displacement’ hulls on creekboats (sometimes adding a soft planing section in the rear as I did on the Riot Big Gun, the Dragorossi Critical Mass and 88) because you’re dealing as much with rocks as with water, and edges can hang up on rocks. It would take 100m to adapt to the different ways a displacement boat paddles to my planing hull playboat.
But that’s changed for me now. The roly-poly feel of a displacement hull makes paddling for me feel weird and aggravates my vertigo (instability). It takes an entire run to adapt to the different feel of a full volume, full-length displacement hulled creeker, meaning I can’t just load up my creek boat and charge some class 5: I need a warm-up run beforehand. That’s a problem that I have heard many times over the years but never really related to.
But I did tailor to it, as did many. The Riot Sniper at 7’2” was the ‘playboaters creekboat’ back in the day, and so was the Dragorossi Mafia at 7’10”. Many others ranged between 7’ and 7’6” and had various design features focused on making your creek boat handle like your playboat.
I read an old review of the 7’2” Riot Sniper on Playak. “The length of the Sniper is perfect for the size of rivers that I find myself on most frequently – small, technical runs. I prefer short, nimble boats that turn easily.” He did go on to say, “The Sniper is at heart a displacement hull kayak. The lack of hard edge plus the excellent turning had an unnerving effect of leaving me pointed in the right direction but going the wrong way.”
I feel the same way.
But this isn’t 2004. Back then, almost all boaters were predominantly playboaters, and they paddled creek boats from time to time. Nowadays, the big sellers are creekboats, so if that’s your everyday go-to design, then whatever it is, it’s what you know. Whether it’s 9’ or 10’ long, has a displacement or a planing hull, is high volume in both ends, or just the nose, it’s what you know. And for these paddlers, this is truly a golden age as the boats are amazing.
But there are a lot of paddlers that paddle primarily a playful boat of some kind most of the time: whether that’s an ICF freestyle boat, a full slice, a half slice or even older river play designs, and for this crowd, the switch to a massive long class 5 bombing missile is not always easy. I know… I’m living that now.
a modern shorter creek boat
It does make me question whether ‘longer is better’ applies to everyone. It’s certainly the trend, but is it ‘the future’ or just ’a future’? Over beers with an old paddling friend, we idly talked about this. One of my arguments was that I felt a need for a modern shorter creek boat. While this was mostly musing, I pondered something in about the 8’ range (245cm), with a modern high sweeping bow rocker so it would handle in the point and skip way of the modern boats, a ‘soft’ (forgiving) planning hull, and a ‘pivotable’ stern so that it would handle more like my go-to boat.
I argued that while this might not be the boat for the likes of the Bren Ortons or Nouria Newmans to use to go and plug some insane river in Pakistan, for Joe Paddler (that I consider myself now to be), there might be some advantages.
Shorter means less weight (load and carry), quicker boat acceleration, less swing weight, and just less overall mass: the new boats are really big feeling. A planing hull (not identical to a playboat, but similar enough) would offer an interaction with the river you’re familiar with, as would the shortened length.
A high volume bow to ride high and dry over whatever the river is throwing at you, but a tail that you can engage with the river, without it being squirly, grabby or back-endery that you can use to paddle the boat like the one you know. If you could cram 300-320ltr (80-85gal) into an 8’ pivotable boat, you might be onto something.
He was sceptical. His first reaction was, “When you did the Big Gun, it was a game changer,” he said. “It just allowed anyone to paddle through anything, and that length and rocker is what made it so good!” The Big Gun was 8’! (His jaw dropped in disbelief; sometimes, our memories are not what we think they are).
The Magnum is 7’10”. The original Nomad was 8’1”, and the Jefe and Stomper were 8’2”. These were all game-changing boats that opened up average creeking in a safe way for the average paddler and that the world’s best used on the hardest runs ever attempted. But that was then, and this is now.
Seven Sisters extreme race
As I sat on a rock watching the Seven Sisters extreme race (50 paddlers charging down a pushy class 5 creek run with some burly holes), I watched and contemplated the boats they were in. What were those 9’ boats doing that an 8’ boat couldn’t do, and the answer for this river was ‘nothing’. The race-winning boat was a Puffy Steeze with a pivotable tail. Just as many fat-tailed boats got trounced in the holes as lower volume tailed boats. But with certainty, the most impressive ‘last second’ saves were all in pivotable boats.
“So,” my friend says. “You like 8’ creek boats now? You think this is the way it’ll go?”
No, not really. I happen to like long, fast boats. I think the new crop of 9’6” to 10’ creekers are awesome, and when you see what the top athletes are doing in them, they clearly work. But, I also think that there is a whole group of paddlers that are paddling typical class 5, without hard charging the most extreme stuff, that would be better served by a lighter, smaller, more nimble and more familiar feeling boat closer to the 8’ mark, and closer in handling to their everyday boat. Hell, I’m one of them!
What exciting times these are!
