tom pinckney wrote:DuluthMoose: beautiful quality boat. Amazingly, I was looking at the same boat from Adirondack Guide Boats yesterday. I'm considering purchasing the pack boat or the next size up (I think it's called the guide boat) for some exercise and for something to fish from. I want one that is Kevlar (cedar is too expensive). Trouble is, there's no place locally (I live in Gaithersburg, Md) that I can try one out. Wondering how you like rowing it and which model do you reccomend? I'm also wondering what's the difference between this boat and a canoe? They both look the same to me. Thanks - Tom
Tom – I don’t own an Adirondack Guide Boat, so I can’t do recommendations on one. However I’ve been on at lest a half a dozen 40 mile long river trips with a friend who rows one. He actually owns 2 of them, I think the 13’ and the 15’. I’ll PM you contact information for him and I’m sure he’ll take the time to answer your questions if you contact him.
The differences between a canoe and an Adirondack Guide Boat as I see them:
- Canoe seats are positioned for the paddler(s) to face forward; guide boats seats, oar locks, and foot brace are positioned for the rower to face backward
- A canoe is generally a narrower craft meant to be paddled with paddles entering the water as vertical as possible; a guide boat has the oar locks on the gunwales, wide enough out from the rower to allow good leverage for the rower to row the boat. You cannot row most canoes unless you mount outriggers for oar holders, the exception being a wide bodied “sportsman’s type canoe with 38” wide gunwales. A solo canoe can be 24” to 31” at the widest across the gunwales. Tandem canoes are generally 32 to 36” at the widest across the gunwates. An Adirondack Guide Boat is about 38” across the gunwales.
- Canoes have a lower shearline than guide boats because they are much more affected by wind in using short leverage paddles for propulsion. To behave better in wind a canoe is kept to a minimum amount of freeboard and the bow is rarely higher than 21”. There is more leverage in oars out to the side of a guide boat for controlling wind and wave forces exerted on the hull. A guide boat has 25” high bow.
- Canoes have a narrower waterline width than guide boats. Because of the extra width and the low seat, a guide boat is generally going to feel more stable than a canoe. Even though a guide boat has wider waterline width, it can generally be rowed faster than a canoe can be paddled. It will take less effort than a canoe does to reach the hull speed of the boat. And like canoes, once the boat is traveling near the hull speed, it is not worth all the extra effort to attempt to get the boat going faster than hull speed. This is where canoe / guide boats differ from racing shells.
- Otherwise there is some overlap between a canoe and a guide boat: notably similar capacity and comparable weight of craft when built from same materials.
However, I do know ALL the words to every verse of Waltzing Matilda ... and most of Banjo Paterson's other poems.)
