White Water Kayak School

I went to a Kayak school for one day, which after I decided that that was enough. The guy who gave the one day training (Rodrigo) was quite frank about the difficulties of pursuing this sport, he told me he lost a lot of business by being so honest. He explained to me that progressing with this sport requires continuous practice, for this one needs a rive close by, to buy all the equipment : the Kayak and the clothing, which is very expensive, and one needs someone else with interest in the sport to go with to the river, as going alone in the river is not recommended. I guess that is why this sport is practiced by so little people.

During the one training day we practiced several kinds of rowing techniques, then we started practicing the Eskimo roll, the maneuver one uses when he and his Kayak are turned upside down in the river, in order to recover to un upright position, towards the end I managed to do this, although not yet with perfection. This required being dipped a lot of times in the cold water, and although I had some good thermal clothes on, I still felt cold.

After a few hours of training I was totally exhausted and I could not do anymore, so we stopped. When I got out of the kayak I had a hard time standing up, since my legs were very tired, but I also felt kind of dizzy, and then I started shivering , both symptoms of Hypothermia. A hot cup of tee, and sitting inside the car with the heating on cured the shivering. But this made think that this sport is definitely not for me, as white water kayak and cold water go together, and I do not think it would not be good for my health if I get Hypothermia after each kayak session.