Quote:
Originally posted by Evenstar
I'm really sick of the contention here that a sea kayak has no place being out on the main lake - especially when 99% of those comments come from people who have never even paddled in a sea kayak.
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Evenstar, if you want to paddle from Alton to Green's Basin and back that's fine, but if you are not willing to make your kayak visible to all boaters that are on the lake, and then blame us because we "come close at high speeds" then that's something else entirely!
Every boater, including you and your kayak, has a legal responsiblity to boat safely, that also means that you can not endanger other vessels because they can't see you.
Hell, my family owned a Freedom 21 for years and there is no way in the world I would have seen you in a kayak if you cut in front of us! The maximum hull speed of a Freedom 21 is 4 knots! Betcha that still would have hurt, or worse.
You want speed limits so you don't get "run down" by high speed boats, yet you refuse to even put a flag on your vessel to make it more visible. You put the responsibility on others when, under the law, each vessel operator is responsible.
I have never paddled a kayak, I have been in my share of canoes and very small rowboats on Lake Winnipesaukee. Common Sense dictates that you don't travel in a vessel like that into traffic! DUH!
I have asked you several times to please tell us about your claims that every time, or nearly every time, or sometimes, when you go out on Lake Winnipesaukee that you encounter high speed boats violating your 150 foot zone. I ask again, you keep repeating the claim but you don't ever say where or when. Please enlighten us.
Speed limits will not have any impact on the congestion on the lake or boneheads that take aim at someone in a bikini in a brightly colored kayak.
So do you really think that you are safer now that the HB847 has passed and will apparently become law although it will divert the Marine Patrol away from duties that they already are apparently lacking?
You've already won the battle (not the war) so stop fighting and join the rest of us on the lake. It's a nice place and we'll do battle again, later.
AW