Wax On: The Philosophy of Sewing a Kayak

Bee`s wax and string for a baidarka frame

Anders unravels with me the way of the kayak backwards in the process. Last week we started with painting and sanding the canvas and paddling. The time since then was an intense and Karate Kid like exercise in doing things as best as I can through sewing canvas and lashing together finished ribs and stringers of the kayak frame. One of my first lessons, WAX ON, always wax the linen string we use to pull tight the canvas and hold strong the kayak frames. The wax keeps the string together while holding it tight. This helps it act like the tight whale baleen of ancient kayaks.

New canvas

We took the canvas of an old children`s Greenlandic kayak that had been used as the sign for Kajakespecialisten. Under the old canvas was a strong frome that needed only minor repairs. We stripped it,  oiled it, and replaced some parts to the frame which you will learn all about in later posts.

The fresh white canvas is much like the state of mind one should be in while building a kayak, as Anders shows by simply being. It is clean and fresh but of substance. We keep the workshop clean, focus on one thing a time, keep our wood fire stove going and stretch the canvas across the kayak, bottom first.

Stitching up to the cockpit

We sew a single seam up the middle top of the kayak, pulling together with uniformity. Each seam is important to be in the right place and pulled tight. It must at the same time totally focused on that stitch, while keeping in mind the entire line of the kayak. We fold the two ends and sew it back onto itself.

The work of building a kayak strengthens ones hands. Just from pulling string through canvas and making lashings tight, my hands are tougher. We are building a long racing kayak from the Aleutian Islands, modeled after a skin covered treasurer in a Russian museum. The last few days I lashed all the ribs together to stringers and the keel (which run the length of the craft). I lashed more than half when I realized I had done them wrong, not deep enough groves into the wood to keep them from rubbing the canvas. A deep breath, we waxed new string, and I would lashed one, remove one, lash one, remove one, until I had erased my mistakes.

Up the seam

Meanwhile, I`ve started working on a kayak from scratch.  I pulled the first two pieces of the frame out of a woodpile. and set them next to the newly sewed kayak. Over the next few weeks I`ll meet what I am learning in reverse, right in the middle. Anders shows me bit by bit, one thing at a time. He tells me the most important is to do you absolute best, even if the guy next to you does twice as much. I do my best and am learning to make it a habit. Even if it is just waxing a little string. Wax on.

Ready to be painted

Master and Apprentice: An Introduction to Inuit Style Kayaks with Anders Thygesen

Norweigan forest near Vestfossen

For the next few months, I`ll have a new home in Vestfossen, Norway as I apprentice with Anders Thygesen, builder of traditional Inuit style kayaks from Greenland to the Aleutian Islands off the Alaskan coast. I`ve already spent a week with Anders and it is obvious he is meant to be a mentor and friend to me in many ways. He will teach me to design a build these frame on skin (though now we use canvas) vessels, along with many other traditional ways of making things, by using intuition, experience, and the surroundings as allies.

Kayakspecilisten, our workshop in a renovated church.

The environment of the Inuit is one of ice and large mammals, the seals, caribou and sea lion all providing skins for the kayaks out shell, while sinew and bones from whales and the treasured driftwood composing the frame. While seemingly far from me as I overlook the gorgeous blue waters and forest hills of Norway, that experience radiates from Anders, who has made a seal skin kayak and paddles in various parts of the Arctic.

Sticking the cockpit on

We start backwards, by learning to finish kayaks first. Anders taught me to sew on the hatches, for storage, and the cockpit, or manhole where the paddler sits.

Cockpit and hatches on an Aleutian style kayak

Once the cockpits  are on, we paint the canvas, sanding in between some six times, until it is smooth and ready to go on the water. It has been great, waking up in the morning to say hello these new kayaks and give them a fresh coat of paint.

Painting the kayaks

Between time in the workshop I explore the Norweigan hills and have paddled with Anders in the water but meters away. Anders just completed a 3000km journey in his kayak and will teach me to paddle these kayaks as one with the body. The kayaks, built like bones, tendons and skin all together, feel like an extension to oneself.

A sunny Norweigan day

My first few days with Anders fit perfectly. I`m already working on a kayak from scratch (to be continued)  and we are truly in the flow. They are unique vessels, each one with its personality, born from the eye of its maker. We will see what sort of eye I may develop and what adventures are to be had in this intensive time of master and apprentice.

Removing old canvas to repair a kayak

Canvas Craft in Denmark: Learning from Svend Ulstrup

Steaming ribs in Svend`s barn workshop.

Svend Ulstrup first went to Greenland with a friend from the North. There he built hunting qajaq (skin on frame boats of the Arctic) with the Inuit and hunted alongside them in their beautiful vessels of survival. Since that time as a young man, he has be building traditional watercraft and teaching an ecological philosophy through the practice of traditional arts. Thomas Soe is a current student of Svend`s in a technique for building canvas canoes (like those in Southern Canada, free form.

Bending ribs

Talking quietly about the world at large as steam rose from our steam box, we bent rib by rib onto a simple form Svend and Thomas had made. Svend uses his eye to place ribs correctly in a canvas canoe with the goal of making them unique and living. This is the process with his qajaq. Once made of seal skin, cotton canvas (and other synthetic cloths) have replaced the covering, but the wooden frame and lashing techniques remain. The eye and feel of the curves is center to making the right shape, it is an intuition. It is not a math, but a nature. Svend seeks to keep alive a native way of building, one that "asks the qajaq" what to do.

Svend and Thomas marking  ribs

Survival, knowledge of the environment, the feel, the respect for the tradition, these are all the ideas Svend plants deeper into my mind for why these traditions are so interesting and important. After a big lunch of liver and sheep meat fresh from Svend`s farm, we go to see the 31 baidarka (qajaq styles from Aleutian Islands near Alaska) he just gathered students to build, an Umiak or open face cargo skin vessel, and a Bronze Age experimental canoe, that may have existed in such a form preVikings. I am glad to know Svend and I am glad Svend knows the Qajaq.

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Svend shows how to use a Nordic Style Axe to cut birch wood.  Svend is always combining the best of the cultures that taught him.

In the continuum of Svend`s knowledge of Greenlandic Qajaq (kayak), I will be spending the next two months in Norway with Anders Thygesen, a colleague of Svend`s. I will become Ander`s apprentice and delve into the production of canvas on frame kayaks made in traditional methods. Over the next few months of articles, you can take part in the process of learning this holistic art.

Viking Waters

Viking Ship Restored at the Viking Ship Museum

It has been a long time since the Viking culture blessed the blue waters and fjord lands of what is now Scandinavia. From Canada, an airplane brought me over the North Atlantic, through Reykjavik (Iceland), a quick and adventurous stop in Olso (Norway), until I reached a chief trading land of the Atlantic's bearded wayfarers, Copenhagen (Denmark). Though the continuum of culture has changed this water plenty city since the Vikings in the 1100's , the hip and aware population has kept alive a few boats. Making the journey (though much faster) the ancestors would have made, I went to meet them.

Viking Burial in Ship (Viking Ship Museum)

Bow of a ship reconstruction using all traditional tools

Roskilde in the Copenhagen area is both an ancient capital and home of the Danish Viking Ship Museum. Not too far from here, five different size Viking ships were found buried in a line to create a natural block during times of strife between different Vikings groups. From these war, fishing, and trade ships, modern Danish have been able to reconstruct vessels which would have been of top importance, in all possible ways to this Nordic culture of the past.

Cutting a plank

The axe is the most important tool in building Viking ships

The hardwoods of the north were used to make a keel based, symmetrical boat that had clinker (overlapping planks) and ribs. Depending on use, these vessels would vary in width, length and other design elements. With these forest materials and a treasured knowledge of the North Atlantic, the Vikings were able to make boats that would venture round Europe, to the Arctic and west to Canada. They were truly masters of their resources, and forever shaped this part of the world with their boats.

On a cargo ship reconstruction

The Viking longship is the most iconic of these vessels, with dragon heads protruding its curved ends and colorful shields riddling the sides. These ships were used to protect lands and to raid others. They were the vessels of culture and spiritual significance, being used for burials of important figures along with wives and favorite horses.

The Sea Stallion, longship reconstruction

Along with my friend Polly, I spent time with the Viking boat builders and sailors in Roskilde. Showing me the axes and design thinking, as well as sharing stories of sailing in the Atlantic was inspiring. This is the ship of my own Scandinavian genetic heritage, and to see the vessels of the past floating on these waters is a source of identity for the present.

Nyhevn's a canal in downtown Copenhagen

Meeting Masters of Canadian Canoes

Tools of master birchbark builder, Rick Nash

I spent time with Rick Nash, master birchbark canoe builder, the other weekend with Uncle Rob. Seeing his fascinating work and learning from this incredibly insightful and hip guy was one of the highlights of my Canada experience.

Rick trying my knife

Rick has become one of the most well learned experts on restoring craft from native birchbark traditions, hundreds of years old. He knows, as best as anyone can, the forms and methods for building these canoes just as they were originally. Rick is a special energy in the canoe building world and I hope to learn more from him as I follow my path. He gave me a rock, sharp for cutting wood, just like the original way. It holds tight next to my knife in my bag, ready to teach me lessons on the rest of the journey this year.

Ted explaining the process involved in such a large strip canoe

I also had the opportunity to meet Ted Moores of Bear Mountain Boats, whom wrote the book Canoecraft, my manual for my first canoe. It was a pleasure and a honor to spent the time with him seeing his workshop. When Jeremy and I left, he talked to us about "keeping the spirit of the traditional canoes alive". An insightful and innovative man, it was a true affirmation to hear him talk about the importance of these traditions.

A bever felled log

 I I spent time, while not at the museum, in a forest near Peterborough making a paddle from a tree that a bever felled. I found a straight section and cut it from the rest of the tree.

Getting the length right

I then split the long in half to make it manageable, using a birch ballet and wedges I made.

ThThe poplar wood wasn't great for making paddles, but the experience of using hand tools is the woods is always valuable.

Wedge forcing a split

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An axe helped on the split aswell

Now where's the paddle?

Cutting it to size with an axe

Once the right piece of wood was scoped in the log, I cut it to size with splits and with my axe.

 Once it was in blank form, unfortunately someone stole it while I went home for the night, so the crooked knife never got to slice the wood down to be a paddle. Oh, well, I hope they finish it!

A view of Big Toad and Moose from Jeremy's on the Indian River

I spent my final days in Canada paddling the Indian River with John and Jeremy, seeing beautiful weather and a coming spring. On to the land of the Vikings and the knowledge of the Arctic.

Wood Chips on the Museum Floor: Honouring CCM's Traditional Collection with Sawdust

Dugout collection at CCM

I don't just mean the wood chips and sawdust that inevitably comes from age old canoes and kayaks like the many in CCM's collection. Yes, its true, traditional crafts degrade naturally, and it is paradoxical for museum's to try and preserve them. Or is it? What if we took a different approach to preserving heritage, rather than putting everything on shelves, why not keep the traditions alive? That's the approach of the Canadian Canoe Museum, to keep the woodchips on the floor from the practice of these age old traditions. 

Kayaks on display

In The Living Tradition and workshop initiatives of the museum, the chips are flying and people are learning, having fun with the traditions. At the museum, you can make paddles, canoes, and learn a host of skills from the past, important for the future. What a better way to learn of other times and cultures, by participating in them!

Russ Parker in a finished skin on frame kayak

I've spent a lot of my time at the museum observing and learning from these efforts. After making my knife, I've had wonderful opportunities to learn from the volunteer artisans that come to the museum to support these programs. Just this week we cut ribs of cedar (and how good it smelled) for a new cedar canvass canoe to be auctioned in support of the museum. A cedar canvass canoe was the first of the "white man's" canoe using Native American designs. Canvass replaces bark and the canoe is built from the inside, ribs first, while the birchbark canoe was built from the outside in. Both are gorgeous.

Jeremy and Russ cutting ribs. 

Jeremy, doin' his thang. Measuring ribs for a new cedar canvass

At the museum there are other opportunities to piece together the past contexts of the crafts. For example there is a trader's store where you can see and feel the goods, particularly pelts, that would have been traded. You can try on clothes of the voyagers or make snow shoes of the far north. You can also play a canoe made into a massive drum (if you didn't know, im a drummer!).

The lovely Lauren, dressed as a voyaguer

The thing that inspires me the most about all of this, is the ability for these traditions to be in dialogue with each other. Canoes from different times, different cultures, places, and perspectives can exist in the same room and it only makes it more peaceful, interesting and fun. I can think of no better metaphor or lesson for modern society than this. 

Dugouts in Dialogue

Making a Mocotuagan: The Crooked Knife of the Northern Native

Using another Mocotaugan to design my handle.

The Mocotaugan, or crooked knife, is the tool of the birch bark building cultures. Drawn towards ones self with one hand, the knife can be used to shape softwoods, bark, roots, and animal skin without using a clamp (simply the other arm) thus being a beautiful tool for bush craft and wilderness survival. It was used throughout what is now Canada, first with bone and sharp rock, and only flourished with the arrival of European steel and the white trader's want for the extremely useful tool.

With the help of Jeremy Ward, I was able to use the Canadian Canoe Museum's Living Tradition facilities to make my first Mocotaugan.

Finding the handle in the wood.

From a piece of maple log squatting in Jeremy's backyard we found a gorgeous handle that has both curly (or flamed) and spalted effects. Curly or flame effects on the wood make distortion of the grain, looking wavy and unique. Spalted effects are a fungus which leaves black lines in a map like pattern through the wood. While it reduces strength, I have confidence in my maple handle. The handle of a Mocotaugan should have a curve away from you where your thumb will rest and give you leverage. 

Arnold Allen is heating my blade red hot to anneal or soften it.

My blade came from the heart of an old table saw blade (1/8th inch thick), cut to a 3/4 inch width and a 6 inch length (2 in the handle, 4 for cutting). It was annealed by metal-master CCM volunteer Arnold, by heating red hot and then cooling slowly, which makes the steel softer.

The process of shaping the blade just right is a tricky one. Most blades come directly out from the handle, though a slight tilt back, away from you, gives a better slicing effect on the wood. Mine is straight out. Mocotaugan can have curved blades at the end or not. Mine curves up, which gives the extra capability of working along longer surfaces or digging in. Once I had gotten my shape just right (including a 90 degree curve into the handle for lasting together), it was tempered and hardened by cooling quickly. 

Workshop in progress, note a hunting knife, top left, given to me by Rob Stevens!!!

Rasping out the handle to put wire, lashing the blade and handle together, on the same level with the wood.

Finishing touches to the handle including cutting a space for the blade, the blade lock (90 degree angle bit), and a lower section for the wire. I gave it three coats of oil and then it was ready for steel!

Chiseling space for the blade

Finished handle, note the curly and spalted effects. The circular handle and map like lines make it look like a globe, how fitting.

The connected pieces. Note that the spalted effects left a center line down the side and the top, strange!

Copper wire is then coiled around the handle and the blade, pulled as tightly as possible. Then ends of each are inserted into small holes. 

Connecting the pieces.

Finished Mocotaugan

Now, using it in the woods!