In this New Year edition:
1. Round up of the year
2. Safety warning for foragers
3. River padding training
4. SmugMug
5. First sea trip of the year
6. Index to all editions up to Winter 25
1. That Was The Year That Was … … 2025
Training
2025 was a productive year for the club with Misha, the club Coaching Coordinator, working hard arranging multiple training sessions for aspiring PaddleSport and Sea Kayak Leaders, with several people having already passed assessments for both. Huge congratulations to Celia, Andrew, Iain, Gary, Margaret, Danny & James. These are serious assessments that couldn’t go ahead without the help of the “guinea-pigs”; many thanks to all of you who volunteered. Thanks also go to the Paddle Scotland (PS) and the club committee, who have invested in the club by subsidising the costs of coaching and assessments for 2025 & 2026.
The training is ongoing with more members who undergoing training & practice sessions and slome with assessments booked or planned for this year. Good luck to them all.
PS have been assisting clubs with a range of coaching and development sessions, so the Misha arranged for Alice McInnes, from SeakayakAlice to deliver a session on Loch Lomond on bow, hanging, and stern strokes. And 2026 has started well with Adam Burns, Development Manager with PS and his wife Emily, giving up their time to support aspirant SKLs by delivering a pool session on rescue techniques including the Hand of God and scoop rescues. We learned a lot and appreciate their time and commitment.
Keep an eye on the calendar and WhatsApp groups for further training opportunities.
As well as this formal training, Misha & Andrew organised skills micro-sessions for everyone interested to develop strokes, skills and techniques. These ran alternate weeks at the pool over the winter and in Loch Lomond over the summer. The programme is being updated and will continue throughout 2026, check the calendar for details.
Trips
As well as all the training events, the club had plenty of opportunities to get down to the core business of paddling. The weather was not always kind to us and some trips were cancelled, notably the Summer Isles long weekend. However, the club expedition to Mingulay, Barra and The Uists was a great success and appears to have exceeded expectations. The trip report and pictures are on the website.
Other long weekend trips went ahead pretty much as planned. Gigha, had to be cut a little short by taking the ferry to the island due to strong winds on the Friday. Aultbea and Skye had just the autumnal weather they had hoped for, with wind and waves to challenge and hone skills and enhance the scenery.
Second Saturday paddles were well supported and went ahead, sometimes on Plan B, but I don’t think any were cancelled for poor weather. Several of the trips went to the ‘Sugar Boat’, making the most of it while it is till there! Others took us further afield to Loch Awe, and Kilcreggan. Plan B trips were generally on Loch Lomond from Luss and Milarrochy Bay.
Tuesday evening Awaydays on the last Tuesday of the summer months proved popular, taking us as far afield as Loch Ard, with Luss and Balamha giving different perspectives of Loch Lomond. The high level of interest in these, 25 paddlers for the last one in August, means they will continue for next year.
The year ended with a very successful Mince Pie Paddle. It took place on the panned day for a change and in benign conditions. An advance group paddled to Inchcailloch to start the BBQs while another group made a short journey over flooded fields to Endrick water before joining the party on the beach.
River trips suffered a bit of a drought during spring and early summer, but the rivers filled for the autumn with trips to Grandtully, The Tummel and Evan Water. A trip to Slovenia is being planned for June next year, see the club calendar for details.
2. Safety Warning
For any scrumpers and foragers out there, beware of plants growing on the Clyde coast that look and smell very much like parsnips. They are NOT a crop that has fallen of ship and started to regrow, or self seeded edible veg, but a type of Hemlock that grows along many of our waterways. The ones I picked were growing in gravelly shingle with the roots standing proud from the surface, still with a few remaining leaves, looking just like the parsnips I used to grow. Luckily, I was reminded of an article I had seen about these being prolific in Argyll & Bute, especially Loch Goil (where we were) and Loch Gilp. I discarded my collection and washed my hands, but could easily have cooked them and suffered the consequences. See -for further inforamtion on hemlock
On a happier note, Loch Goil is a brilliant place for collecting mussels, they were the tastiest I think I have ever had, very sweet and juicy with no gritty bits. Iain has been collecting muscles from here for years and says that he has never found sand, grit or any pearls in the Goil mussels.
3. River Padding
River Paddling?
What is this river malarky about? We have some images and video of the mighty River Teith last summer to view at: https://dckc.smugmug.com/DCKC-2025/River-Teith-Summer-2025
Moving Water and River Paddling
In April we aim to run an intro to river kayaking and moving water course at Pinkston based initially in the “flat but moving” water basin and then moving onto the white water course with the artificial river on its lowest “1 pump” setting. If you are able to paddle in control on flat water in a general purpose kayak then this is a great first step to handling currents, waves and more. Sessions will be on Thursday nights with date in April to be confirmed – keep your eyes peeled!
River Paddling in the Pool
If you are already in the early stage of river paddling or even progressed onto Grade 2 or 3 then Graham is planning to use the Feb/March pool sessions he is at to do some coaching based around some of the key skills to paddle on moving water, from skulling and moving in holes, to control of edge for surfing, key stroke for maneuvering including the boof and more. If you have an existing roll then we can look at bomb-proofing and having a strong recovery stoke. Session start time will be 8pm at the deep end, speak to Graham on the night.The river coaches and leaders are having a wee planning meeting soon to put together a program of Grade 2 trips around Scotland. Keep your eye in the calendar. The Grades are covered here: https://dckc.co.uk/river-grades/
4. What is Smugmug? https://dckc.smugmug.com/
The club has a place for photos to live forever! We can create a photo/video gallery and upload link for you to add images from a trip or event that can then be saved in full resolution and capture the year in pictures. Email; Graham if you need an upload link for a trip.
5. First sea trip of the year
Second Saturday Paddle – The Clyde – Boden Boo to Lang Dyke
Leading a Second Saturday paddle with DCKC is made more testing if the forecasters don’t agree with each other and all keep changing their minds about what we should expect on the day. The club paddle on 10th January was a case in point. Living in Perthshire we had had temperatures of minus 8c, snow, rain, fog and rain turning to black ice in the week preceding the event but the forecast for Erskine on BBC and XC was consistently “fine” with temperatures hovering just above zero.
See Trip reports for the remainder of this article and SmugMug for more pictures.
- Updated Index
The previous editions of The Craic’n contain a huge wealth of information showing a wide range of activities this club participates in. Much of the writing is the personal stories and learning experiences of members ranging from hints and tips for kit and technical matters through to health and safety, community involvement and child protection.
To make these more accessible I have updated the index of articles since inception in October 2022, excluding the trip reports as there is a place on the website for these. However, as they are not all there, I will make time to compile an index for these too. Meanwhile, they are in the index that appeared is in The Craic’n Winter 2025 edition.
All the previous editions can be found here
| Health & Safety | Book Reviews | ||
| Child protection & wellbeing | Jan 24 | Argonauts of the Scottish Isles | Sep 23 |
| Hypothermia & cold water shock | Nov 22 | Moderate becoming good later | Sep 24 |
| Ready for warm-ups – Dec 22 | Feb 23 | Carry on Kayaking | |
| Significant events & lessons learnt | Nov 23 | Keep calm and … … | Nov 22 |
| Social/ Community | Keep fit and … … | Jun 23 | |
| Canal litter-pick | Jan 23 | Stay warm and … … | Jan 24 |
| Celia’s story | Jan 23 | Qualify and … … | Aut 25 |
| DCKC – SCA Club of the year | Nov 23 | Kit | |
| Diversity equality & inclusion | May 24 | Folding Kayaks | Sum 25 |
| Gender debate | Mar 23 | Greenland paddles | Sep 23 |
| Gerry Gallagher RIP | Jul 24 | Knickers in a twist | Sum 25 |
| Graham’s birthday biography-Sep 22 | Jul 23 | Roof racks | Jul 24 |
| Interview with Bev | Jan 25 | Storm cags – Sum 25 | Aut 25 |
| Local community update – Nov 22 | Dec 22 | Towlines – Nov 23 | Mar 24 |
| Mince pie paddles – Jul 23 | Jan 25 | Warm hands in winter | Nov 24 |
| Pinkston pool party | Nov 22 | Sustainability | |
| Pumpkin paddle – Oct 22 | Aug 23 | Car sharing | May 24 |
| Sea cadets – Oct 22 Nov 23 | Nov 24 | Giving wildlife helping hand | May 24 |
| Volunteering | Oct 22 | Leave no trace | Aug 23 |
| You said – we did | May 24 | What can I do? | Jan 24 |
| Training | Other Stuff | ||
| Efficient, fast forward paddling | Nov 22 | Canoe polo restarting | Jul 24 |
| Embrace the capsize | Jul 23 | Coaching coordinator update | Feb 23 |
| Embrace the fear | Aug 23 | Donner & blitzen | May 24 |
| Emergencies on the sea | Nov 22 | Gift ideas | Win 2 |
| Expeditions core kit | Jan 24 | Heads or tails; river or sea paddling | Feb 23 |
| Gel repairs – a good contact | Dec 22 | Improving & learning with the club | Mar 23 |
| Night paddling | Nov 24 | Micro-session: massive fun | Sep 24 |
| Packing your sea kayak | Jun 23 | Mountain & bothy bagging | Jan 24 |
| Paddle your open canoe | Sep 22 | Paddle Scotland Benefits | Sum 25 |
| Paddling the peaks | Jan 24 | Paddlesport Leader assessment | Aut 25 |
| Repairs & maintenance – Jul 23 | Apr 23 | Pool sessions – Nov 22 | Aug 23 |
| River features | Nov 23 | Pre-season checklist | Mar 24 |
| Rolling – 10 things before you start | Sep 23 | Starting your paddling journey | Feb 23 |
| Sea kayaking fundamentals – Feb 23 | Mar 23 | Washing kit | Aut 25 |
| Sea kayak leader training | Mar 23 | Why I kayak | Nov 24 |
| Weather Apps | Jan 25 | ||
| Wind & waves – Nov 22 Feb 23 | Jul 23 |
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