342 FOREST AND STREAM AUGUST, 1921 
CANOE CRUISING ON SALT WATER 
THE SPORT OF CANOE SAILING FINDS ITS GREATEST SCOPE ON THE 
WIDE AND SHALLOW REACHES OF OUR COASTAL WATERWAYS 
By WARREN H. MILLER 
I N all our great bays and harbors, the 
seas that get up in a blow are so 
rough that an open canoe is hardly 
feasible, so, in its place the canoeist has 
a wonderful pastime in canoe sailing. 
Thirty years ago the wooden sailing 
canoe had great vogue and had many ar- 
dent devotees. That great organization, 
the A. C. A., had thousands of members 
and the meets brought together hundreds 
of sail canoeists for the annual camps 
and they could beat anything of their 
inches that carried canvas, and live in a 
sea that sent big catboats into harbor 
with three reefs in. Of these craft I 
built four, my chums two or three apiece, 
and, for long cruises down the great salt 
water bays of the Atlantic Coast, sleep- 
ing in the canoe every night, they were 
simply unbeatable! Fourteen feet long 
by 32-inch beam and a foot deep, were 
the preferred dimensions, with a six-foot 
Down the bay to some favorite fishing place 
canvas covered canoe is not “limp and 
logy”; instead she is fast and lively; she 
will not sink when capsized but will keep 
herself afloat and you too. And she 
paddles like a bird with the double-blade 
paddle, which the wooden sailing canoe 
would never do on a light man’s strength. 
We cruised in ours for weeks at a time. 
Sometimes it would be but a day’s expe- 
dition up some big salt marsh creek after 
railbirds and snipe; on other occasions 
it would be a fishing trip, down the bay 
to some favorite bank, where the canoe 
would be moored to an oyster stake, while 
its crew attended to the fish market; 
again, it would be an extended consort 
trip of two or more of these canoes, when 
both of them would be hauled out on the 
beach and the cockpit tents set up, while 
a board running from one canoe to the 
other would make the eating table. Many 
a night have I dozed off to sleep, with 
the strong, salt breeze strumming 
through the guy ropes of the canoe cock- 
pit tent, the mosquitoes humming ai lively 
tune outside, while within there would 
be solid comfort from the muslin mat- 
tress, filled with fragrant sage, and mak- 
ing the round contours of the canoe as 
comfortable as your bed at home. I have 
paddled out into a roaring sea that even 
a large sloop would respect, in those able 
little decked canvas canoes, setting up a 
and racing events. At the Thousand 
Island Camp these meets still take place, 
but in almost all inland waters the open 
Indian type canoe has displaced the wood- 
en sailer, because the former permits 
long portages through the brush, and 
can go on cruises which the heavy wood- 
en canoe, weighing itself about 100 
pounds, could not attempt. 
However, in our salt water bays, the 
sport of canoe sailing is at its best, and, 
as there are no portages, the wooden 
“poor man’s yacht” is the means of much 
enjoyable cruising. The cheaper models 
of wooden sailing canoes cost from a 
hundred dollars up, with a set of sails. 
Such a craft is very able and seaworthy, 
and, with metal, fan-shaped centerboard 
and huge bat-wing sails, makes a won- 
derful cruiser, for she can be hauled up 
for the night anywhere, and will put one 
in touch with bay and surf fishing, and 
snipe and duck shooting, too, in season, 
with great comfort. The problem of how 
to get there is always one that besets 
both the surf fisherman and the wild- 
fowl shooter, particularly on a lone 
cruise. It is, however, a man’s job, a 
boat for a husk. The wooden, decked 
canoe has always been popular, but for 
youths and light-built men she is so 
heavy to paddle that, until one is six- 
teen years old or over, it is too hard 
work to be fun. However, when we were cockpit in which you could sleep when rag of sail and beating to windward like 
boys we did not let that worry us. We the canoe was hauled out on the beach a flying fish, and only once in hundreds 
built decked canvas-covered sailing ca- and the sand banked up around her. of miles of such canoeing have I been 
noes that weighed about forty pounds Contrary to the general impression upset. It was during a squally north- 
and had two sails, mainsail and jigger, spread by writers who do not know, the west blow, and I was snipe shooting on 
The author and his sailing canoe 
