Well, that’s one way around social distancing while still kayaking.
Liquidlogic kayak designer Shane Benedict came up with a unique approach to maintaining distance while still kayaking his favorite back yard run — the Green River in North Carolina — by doing two back-to-back, leg- and lung-busting, human-powered shuttles to get back up to the put-in.
“Well I can’t move my legs or my arms, but I went for the Weekend Corona Virus Self Shuttle 200 percent this weekend on the Green River,” he posted on Facebook.
To do so, he first did the hike-up shuttle on the Pulliam Creek trail and across the Big Hungry cut for his first lap. Then, for lap #2 he biked the Turkey Gut shuttle today from the lower Green.
The hiking shuttle was 12.69 miles, with a whopping 2,105-foot elevation gain, and took him 3 hours, 41 minutes. The next day’s bike shuttle covered 12.75 miles, gaining 1,784 vertical feet over 2 hours 33 minutes. All that makes cleaning rapids like Gorilla a relative breeze, and the run’s other Class V rapids a walk in the park compared to the sufferfest shuttles.
But it shows the creativity paddlers are pursuing while still feeding their paddling jones. And before you consider duplicating his feat, be advised to carefully acknowledge the hashtags at the end of his post:
#crampstonight #deskworktomorrow #superfun#videotofollowofmesweating #itsgonnabehot