Ok folks.. here it is, after months of blood sweat, tears, trials and tribulations, Steve has emerged from Orca H.Q. with our very own, unique design of ply based handmade clinker style open Canadian Canoe. Here she is happly floating on derwentwater on her madien voyage, with a fine send off of Orca roadies to watch the event. This canoe is now ready for you guys to build on any of our canoe building workshops that we run in the Lake District. Check out the web site for dates. The pics say it all.

New canoe

Now the nights are getting longer we are back in the lab and working on our new clinker-based design of canoe. We've finished one canoe already but she's only 95% right, so no.2 is on the way.. we'll settle for a 98% pass. She'll be launched tomorrow, so we'll upload some photos of her maiden voyage.. This one's a much longer process at 4 1/2 days..

2011 course dates.

Check out the web site for all 2011 courses dates and canoe building workshops dates that have been a real success this year, and thanks to all who have been on a trip this year.

Sweden

Contented Gemma

Food

As seems to be the norm these days, we had flood warnings on the first day of our Sweden expedition. Our local weatherman told us to 'sleep in our life vests'.

Female Larch (Larix) flowers only last a couple of weeks before they turn to an immature cone after fertilisation.

The larch trees of the Dunkeld crags were planted by cannon by the 4th Duke of Atholl.

Butterburr (Petasites hybridus) - a member of the Daisy family and so named because during the middle ages it was used to wrap butter, has the largest leaves of all the uk natives. The male flower seen here bottom left is tiny, but will produce leaves upto 3 feet across! The rarer female flowers are blue.

Corylus avelanna (Hazel) catkins with buds ready to pop. There is a great old saying which goes.. when the Hazel buds are as as big as a squirrels toe, the birch sap is good to go.. Each catkin produces around 4 million pollen grains. The catkins are all male and pollenate the female part of the tree - often on the same branch.

Yew shaft canoe paddle

We came across a group of recently felled several ancient Yew trees at a local woodland in the Borrowdale valley. Although struggling to see exactly why they were felled, we are trying to make the best of a bad thing by utilising the timber..

It's not much to look at just now, but the pictures show the contrast of the heartwood against the sapwood. Note that the branch is pretty darn straight in one plane. Green wood seasons at about 1 year per inch thickness..
1 1/4'' SHAFT = See you in 15 months!

The quest for the perfect open canoe

In our continuing search for the perfect canoe, this is a stitch and tape amalgamation prototype we are currently building at the 'lab'

We took a few days out this winter.. this was a classic view we had to endure.. After a -4 freeze that got the better of the camera battery, the topmost layer of the lake had frozen into the most impressive crystalline forms..

Winter paddling on Derwentwater, Lake District

sdd

Paul Weller on indoor paddling

Paul keeps his hand in on Lisa Suttles state of the art C1 SIMULATOR.. Lisa is currently our biggest hope for gold at the London Olympics. Read more about Lisa's paddling career at www.lisasuttle.com

Future canoe craftsman

Craig and Matthew Fearon are currently training to be a part of the Orca canoe build team.. Remember, always start on something you can actually finish - like a 'spatuloon'.. and keep those fingers out of the way..!

Easter paddle making

Our handmade paddle selection is growing after a busy winter working on some new designs. The process is fairly straightforward with a basic knowledge of woodworking tools. These paddles are 'bent - shaft' and are made from locally sourced timber - predominantly ash and yew and take a couple of days to complete.

Canadian Canoe Museum website

We've just come across the website for the canadian canoe museum in Ontario, Canada. If you fancy a sit-down 'virtual tour', then take a look. There are some pretty inspirational artworks to gawp at..

Happy browsing! http://www.canoemuseum.ca/

Paul gets married

Thanks to everyone who has been on a course this year. All courses went well despite the heavy rain on the River Runner. Steve and Dan made their 2nd trip out to Sweden in late September and have found a cracker of a trip, see our courses page for more info.
New for next year is our long awaited canoe building workshop, to be run in Keswick, so you can at last build your very own canoe.
Also congratulations to Paul Weller on his marriage to Claire back in August.

Welcome

Welcome to the ORCA Blog. Here we hope to keep you informed of how our courses are doing, and what we at ORCA are up to. If you would like us to publish any pics or info, just contact us.