The Competition

Here are the other eight boats in the cardboard boat regatta last weekend. We’ll start with these two.

The yellow boat here is the one that took first place in the speed contest. They did a great job. I missed their run, as I was hauling Redux up the bank when their race occurred, but I heard they put three people in this tandem kayak. They did a fantastic job and had some good paddlers. I was very impressed!

The white one was very nicely done too. When the race was over, they actually mounted an outboard motor on it and took it out for a spin. They raced against the yellow one, but the yellow one beat it too. The front of this boat had a water cannon mounted on a rotating turret. After they lost their powered race against Woodstock, they began chasing the safety canoes, and squirting them with the water cannon. I think everyone enjoyed that spectacle.

Let’s see what else we had.

The most amazing thing about this one was that it completed the course without capsizing. I thought this one was the scariest boat. I have a shot of them paddling it back to the dock, and the look on the face of the girl in the bow says “I am terrified!” I would have been too.

This was not the only V-bottomed boat though. Portsmouth also had one.

They may have won a ribbon for creativity – I was late to the awards ceremony, so I’m not sure. They sure should have won a ribbon anyhow. Bananas are not known for their racing ability.

I don’t know which clubs entered these next few boats, but they were all very seaworthy, and I think the kids in those clubs deserved a pat on the back.

This was a well-executed catamaran. The major problem i saw with it was that it would have been pretty difficult to paddle on the starboard side because of the outriggers. The grass skirts more than make up for that though.

So that’s what we were up against. I hope you have all enjoyed our cardboard boat adventures, but I know you could not have as much as I did. Thanks for stopping by!