in article , Wilko van den Bergh at
wrote on 2/10/06 3:02 AM:



!Jones wrote:
On Mon, 09 Jan 2006 15:46:33 +0100, in rec.boats.paddle Wilko
wrote:


wrote:

I would gravitate toward a normal double sea kayak.
8,000 year old technology and nothing but a paddle to break. You will
have two anyway and i would carry a spare.
Thats just me.
Alex
http://pages.ivillage.com/mcgruer

Two words: "Divorce boat"!

( This coming from a long time Topo-Duo enthousiast:
http://kayaker.nl/niels-35.jpg )


This idea comes from the fact that people will tend to buy such a
thing looking for a patch for an already failing marriage. Consider
how much exercise equipment is owned by people who are morbidly obese;
does exercise equipment, therefore, cause obesity?

We are tandem bicycle enthusiasts and enjoy riding thus; we'd probably
do OK in a tandem kayak except that my wife has an upper body
handicap.

Jones, bicycles are not nearly the same as kayaks. For example, on
whitewater you can't stop everywhere when it suits you, if you flip,
coming up with two paddlers in one boat you require good cooperation,
and on a river, deciding where to go next is quite a different thing
when both paddler can actually steer the boat in different directions,
countering each other's effectiveness out. A bicycle only has one person
steering...

Having said that, I don't disagree with your assertion that there is
already something wrong with the relationship before they got into the
boat, but you could have read that from my other posts further down the
thread. :-)

Heehee. And I don't think the idea of the "divorce boat" is that you will
actually get divorced. It just means that a lot of couples become unhapy
with them.

When my wife and I were first looking into kayaking the various outfitters
all told us pretty much the same thing about tandem boats, which was that
most people become unhappy with them in a short period of time because they
are limiting. They wanted to be able to take trips together, but not have to
take the exact same trajectory and see the exact same things.

It's obvious that anything is possible...a couple with a very healthy
marriage could end up not enjoying the tandem experience or a couple with a
crappy marriage might actually love it.

But the tag "divorce boat" got put on tandems because, imo, people involved
in the kayaking industry learned - as a generality - that couples tend to
become unhappy with them.

Keenan
gokayaking.ca