Where it all started !

I Just wanted to mention a new link I have put on my Blog, titled-- 'Where it all started, Kayaks and Paddles UK '
Check it out, it will take you to the best Canoe and kayak retail stores in the UK.

Kayaks and Paddles was the first of these stores and is where I started life as a professional kayaker [ This is not to say I make a living from just kayaking but that I make a living with in the sport one way or another, retail, instruction, safety kayaking, guiding , consulting, etc ]

Kayaks and paddles was started by Bob dyer who remarkably gave me a job when I knew nothing about selling kayaks or business or even talking with people, but I did know a fair bit about kayaks.
This was right at the start of his first store and now 10 years or more down the line this store and others have become a giant success.
Because I no longer live in the UK, I no longer work at Kayaks and paddles but I put my experience there as the main reason that I turned a sport into a life style.
Bob and the store gave me the confidence to go after what I wanted, he also gave me the time off I needed to pursue those goals including months at a time to travel to places like Nepal, Costa Rica and Ecuador where I completed many of the 30 or so first descents I have done.

It was always fun to work there, with constant humor and piss taking, it taught me that any thing can be achieved when you have the will to try, but at the same time to not take it to seriously, because what's the point unless it's fun.

I think I have stood by the philosophy of Kayaks and paddles [although we would never have said we had a philosophy, which is far to big a word for Bob anyway] in the way I chose to continue the kayaking lifestyle when others have slid away for more traditional life styles, personally I can't imagine a better way to live, at least for me, and I owe a lot of that to my time at Kayaks and Paddles.

We even invented new words that had great meaning to the people mad enough to understand them, words like Kermufittypuff and Numpty both of which are being used to some degree in the rafting and kayaking community I live in now in the USA.



Kayaks and paddles was the best start to the most enjoyable career I can imagine.

The photo's on this post were taken by Steve Brooks my good friend and often my kayaking partner when I lived in the UK.

From the top they show me about 10 years ago running rope swing falls on the river Plym, a class 5 run that gives the city of Plymouth its name and where I learnt a lot about white water.

Then we have one of the trips Bob gave me the time to do, this time in Corsica the birth place of extreme kayaking, a very young looking me runs a drop on the restonica river, I even had hair back in those days !

To this day even though I have not lived in the UK for almost 8 years I still have a good friendship with Bob and his Canoe shops team, and we still have fun dreaming up new and wacky ideas which are primarily just to make us laugh while maybe selling a few kayaks or something, watch this space for more news and also a new spot on the www.canoe-shops.co.uk website titled ' what's in the box Andy '

Thanks Bob.