The Purple Mirage

Susanita

Welcome to my website. Above is a photo of me, Susanita, in my loft working on my iMac. The website is mostly about my adventures in sea kayaking, kayak racing and now outrigger canoe. I've been kayaking since 1998 when I took my first whitewater kayaking class at Great Falls. I have to admit I wasn't immediately drawn to the sport. But whitewater kayaking is a little different from sea kayaking. First of all you have to wear these hideous helmets and nose clips. And you spend a lot of time upside down under the kayak. It took me about a year to get over my fear of drowning when the kayak flipped. But eventually I moved on to running Class III rapids and grew to love it. In 2003 I bought my first sea kayak, an impex mystic and started exploring calmer water. Since then I've moved into kayak racing, kayak design and building, dragonboat paddling and most recently outrigger canoeing. Basically I just love being on the water.

So the blog is mostly about kayaking. But this fall and winter I'm going to try some backpacking. I have a friend who wrote a book on ultralight backpacking which I've been reading. Ultralight seems like the way to go. So I hope to incorporate some land based adventures in the future.

Thanks for stopping by,
Susanita

This is one of my kayaks. It's a Huki/Futura S1-A surfski. I got it primarily to kayak fast. Initially I had no intention of racing. But after I bought it I met some women who were into recreational racing. So last summer me and my S1-A participated in five recreational kayak races. Four of the race reports are archived on the blog.

This is me before the Broadkill race. I'm really into "things." Some of the things I bought this year for racing were my waterproof IPOD and my Garmin Forerunner GPS. The IPOD was to help me kayak and the GPS was to tell me how I was doing. I won a few races and I placed in a few. But it was all about fun.

Here's me in my favorite kayak, the Mirage 530. I imported this kayak from Australia and had it custom painted in a purple fade. It's an awesome ocean kayak. It surfs well. It turns well thanks to the integrated rudder. It has a built in electric pump. And it's light at about 45 pounds. Whereever I go I'm always taking pictures of my kayak. You'll see alot of this kayak in the photo albums.

This is Maribel. I love animals. And while it may seem that I'm a cat person ... because I don't have a dog right now. I love them both. Before she died, my dog Gracie was my constant companion. She loved to go with me on weekend trips to the crag when I was rockclimbing. But I couldn't take her kayaking. So when she passed away I decided to just keep cats. It's easier because they're more independent. And Maribel is very outgoing ... more like a dog.

This is Annabel. She's Maribel's younger sister. She's smaller than Maribel but she's quick and feisty. Her hobbies include climbing trees and birdwatching. She does not like to have her picture taken.

Here is a photo I took on a recent kayak trip to Chincoteague, Va. I use an Olympus Stylus SW which is a waterproof digital camera when I'm kayaking. When I'm on dry land I use a Sony DSC-H7. Both are great cameras. The Olympus is not a high tech SLR but I like it because it's small and I can strap it to my PFD. It's always there when I want to take a photo. The Sony is what's called a "bridge camera". It's kind of like a hybrid. It has many of the features of an SLR ... larger, better lens, higher pixel resolution. But it's packed into a compact body. It takes great wildlife photos!

Photography is another hobby and lately I've been taking alot of photos on my kayak outings. On the Photo Gallery page are links to the various photo albums I've created so far.