Yesterday evening I resurrected my sewing machine skills and worked on creating three fleece bags to protect my Greenland paddles in storage and transit.
I used pill resistant recycled plastic fleece, to keep my life simple I purchased 3 yards of the fabric rather than having to stitch shorter strips together. I had all-sorts of fun learning how to wind the bobbin and then finding a big enough needle to take the extra strong thread. The machine ate my first few attempts but then finally I got the tension right and was able to sew the seven foot long seems (twice). I turned the top over and created a tube to thread a draw string through and added a cord clamp. I am pleased with the outcome although I would not want too close an inspection of the straightness of the seams!
My plan is for the paddles to live in these bags, inside my drain pipe transporter when they are not in use. I noticed that already one of the paddles has a ding in it that broke through the epoxy and is eventually going to blacken the wood if I don’t deal with it. This is clearly why many people use oil on bare wood instead of more modern treatments. I certainly am growing more interested in the idea of carving a paddle myself to see how it turns out.
