Communicating with Bow Paddlers

[@yulaiyuk]

Thank you so much. I love your details instructions about canoeing camping, ⛺️ 🛶 🌲

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Glad you like them! Thanks for watching.

[@RayGoodwinCanoe]

Lots of good tips on working with a novice bow paddler. Great stuff. I will be working on tandem video soon and the difference with an experienced bow. PS I love the 3 min format.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Thanks Ray, it means a lot coming from you. You’ve been doing some amazing trips. Can’t wait for the videos. “Do not go gently into that dark night, rage, rage against the dying of the light!”

[@AnonYmous-ii4tc]

Wow, quite a compliment to have Easy watching your videos! Go team!

[@ocean1233]

Thank you very much Lisa‼️☺️

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

You’re very welcome. Thanks for watching.

[@Heartwoodbows]

Great information. Very similar to how I learned to communicate with a group of new paddlers in a river raft.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Yes, you have to keep it simple or they’ll feel like they’re drinking from a fire hose. Plus they’re scared, it’s new, sometimes you’re telling them something and you look at their face and you know you sound like the teacher and Charlie Brown.

[@AnonYmous-ii4tc]

Lisa, i love these videos. Great format. Excellent catch phrase. (Look at the camera lens though, please, not the screen). Thumbs up on "spread the word..." I am trying! Huge tip to use a stop weird, thank you! I'd consider myself somewhat of a beginner canoeist, perhaps a bit more as I'm still within my first 2-3 seasons, though I've paddled kayaks for over 10 years, and I've been around "high stress environments" throughout life. Excellent tips on using simple, single words, but i also like to differentiate the words more because, Cross, Draw, Halt, Stop, Go, all can sound so similar in an emergency situation. Especially with different accents, like on a guided trip. (Like Ha and Gee are completely different for dogs to hear) Please let us know if you have other great commands that fit this, which are also common daily words so our partners are not learning new words, trying to remember them when stressed. (I.e. not port & starboard if they aren't already sailors). I do use "right" or "back" because of this.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Yes, back is a good one to slow the boat. Keep it simple and if they make a mistake or can’t hear just be prepared to save it. Thanks for watching.

[@BurtReynoldstash]

Great video Lisa. As per. Looking forward to getting out paddling in warmer weather, more daylight hours. Happy 🛶

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Me too!

[@jiddo4440]

Informative and entertaining. Thanks Lisa

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Glad you enjoyed it!

[@MaineGuide34]

Another great video Lisa and I can't wait to get out onto the river. Stay safe

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Me too! What a wet, raw Winter.

[@AdamUnpronounceable]

Great and timely topic. Currently working on getting my partner and her daughter into canoeing. We're mostly on flat water though, so usually don't have to worry about noisy rapids, just other boaters.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

I was Guiding a trip on a busy lake and almost had 2 of my canoes run over by a motor boat. The boat sat so high compared to the canoes, and the was going so fast that his line of sight was right over the canoeists heads. Me whaling on my life jacket whistle is the only thing he slowed down to and then thank God he saw the canoes and didn’t plow into them. Life jacket whistles are cheap and worth their weight in gold. Thanks for watching and stay safe out there.

[@rcote1234]

These are great tips. Will use them. Thx!

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

You're so welcome!

[@mojopahitvlog8473]

Nice sharing dear friend ❤🙏🏻

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Thank you! Cheers!

[@jhuntley575]

Your awesome love your videos. Im going in for my guides exam next month!

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Good luck!! Keep me posted I have a Guides River practicum I’m doing this Summer. I kept the price really reasonable just for new Guides. Check it out at 3MinutesMaineGuide.com.

[@swirledworld340]

I usually repeat my commands several times with out them hearing then I whisper "hey doofus" that they hear loud and clear 😂

[@akcarlos]

I dont know why so many people cant understand that, so many time I have seen people trying to have long discussions about what they should do in the middle of a rapid, its too late to do that and you wont hear most of the message except the last word.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

So true.

[@downeastprimitiveskills7688]

Looks like water levels are above normal just about everywhere. Sound advice.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Thanks for watching and always supporting. Hey I’m gonna be on the Munsungan to the Aroostook May 28-June 1st any chance I’ll run into you?

[@downeastprimitiveskills7688]

@@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide I don't get north too much. but I am still planning on the poling even in Bangor.

[@GreatNorthWeb]

When we canoe with friends and their spouses, we don't call it "canoeing", we call it "divorcing". Kidding aside, it is very hard to hear the bow paddler talking because their voices are projecting out of the front of the canoe and are unheard at the back of the boat. I encourage bow paddlers to turn their heads and project their voices to the rear.

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

Yes that does help. I can’t tell you how many couples I’ve separated when Guiding “for the good of the trip”.

[@grahamfisher5436]

Another great video Do you know of a chap here in the Uk called Ray Goodwin Check out his canoe channel 😊

[@3_Minutes_With_a_Maine_Guide]

I do we’ve been emailing back and forth. My buddy Harry Rock did a UK symposium on Poling with Ray. Harry and I taught poling at the Maine Canoe Symposium for decades. Love it.