Introductory Rescues

Saturday night Robyn and I spent the evening at the Crystal Pool in Victoria participating in the Ocean River Introductory Rescues course. Our main goal this evening was to learn how to self rescue ourselves with our new paddle floats in the event that we should capsize out in the elements.  Looking back to our first introductory course last October we sure have come a long way in terms of equipment and the number of times we have been on the water since then. This being our last introductory course in the series we felt very prepared for the course using our own boats and equipment.

After checking with our instructor (Janette) and the other 3 students in the class, I mounted our GoPro Hero 2 with the suction cup on the front decking of my kayak (tethered) with the lens pointed at my cockpit. I thought it would be a great opportunity to check out the video capabilities of the camera as well as capturing the underwater footage of my wet exits. Stopping and starting the camera a few times during the course I managed to get some really good video.

The video clip is 6:43 minutes long and I start my capsize at around the 2:00 minute mark. For you seasoned kayakers do you see what I did wrong in this wet exit?? Sure I got back in the kayak but watch what happens when I'm upside down. You know that handle which I call the "Holy Crap" handle? It works better if you actually pull it before trying to exit the kayak!  LOL

After using a trial version of Sony's Movie Studio HD Platinum 11 software, I purchased the full blown package this morning on line and downloaded it to my computer ready to use in less than 10 minutes. Isn't technology wonderful?? I'm not the greatest techno gearhead and it took me a bit to figure out how to "trim" a clip so that I could post it on the blog. Looks like I have a bit of research to do to really understand what this software can do for me. 

What a great way to capture our kayaking adventures