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Paddling the waters of SW Florida and beyond
April 18, 2007 MEETING
MINUTES FOR GULF COAST BACKWATER PADDLERS There were 10 members in attendance. The April meeting of the Gulf Coast Backwater Paddlers started at 7:16pm on April 18, 2007 at the Backwater Outfitter’s Store in Matlacha on Pine Island Road. Diane LaPell opened the meeting with a rather humorous poem from Phil Coral about their Echo Park trip. Then Rusty did his poem for the toast to the moon on the Moon Light paddle, which was held on April 2nd. New members sign in and introduce themselves. The new members present were: The current members also introduced themselves and the meeting of April 22, 2007 began. The first item presented were trips taken and the need to schedule more for May. Lynette Brown did two trips: Her fishing trip to Bunch Beach, Fort Myers on April 6th was great. Along with her were Dave Prescott and Carol. They caught a lizardfish, blowfish, a mangrove snapper and 4 small trout. Her second trip to Jug Creek at the Bokeeila boat ramp was fabulous. With her was Teresa (what is her last name). The paddle was beautiful. They saw many pelicans, egrets, osprey, ibis and herons. She had two great paddles. Diane
LaPell and Rusty Batchelor went over the details of the Collier Seminole Camping
trip they went on the weekend of March 23rd with
the Space Coast Paddlers from Melbourne Fl.
They paddled the Black River Run to Mud Bay the whole trip was a 15 mile
loop. There was also bike riding
and hiking trails in the park so there were other things to do as well. Saturday
night they all grilled out and gathered together for a social. Sunday they hiked
the Corkscrew Sanctuary before packing up and heading for home. This was an incredible trip and is highly recommended. Rusty
went over his adventure at Collier Seminole Park with his kayak capsizing. He
learned a hard lesson about having a paddle float and a handheld pump with you
at all times. And how crucial it is to practice and know how to get back into
your kayak. Thank goodness he made it back in and is fine. Safety is the key issue. With
that in mind we went on to kayak safety. Everyone
voiced their opinions and experiences on the issue. In May (soon to be
scheduled) Lynette Brown will be holding a safety class. This class is intended
to help members become familiar with their kayak and what to do should you be
leading or need to help someone who is in need of help. This class is free to
paid members but guest will have to pay a small fee.
You will be getting more info on this as it become available. So we urge
everyone to attend this class. We
discussed the possibility of the club gathering some kayaking videos for members
to use. From
there we went on to up coming dates. The
biggest date coming up is the Pine Island Cleanup on April 21st.
We need your help. Diane is working on getting the Matlacha Park to let
us hold our club meetings at the parks clubhouse for free.
If we show that we can help to keep the waters clean.
This clean up is important. We will be taking off from Backwater
Outfitters store at Matlacha at 8:30am. Diane
and Rusty will be leading two trips on Sunday April 22 on the Orange River from
Manatee Park in Fort Myers launching at 9:00am return around 12:00 and will have
an annual picnic. On Saturday April 28th they have a trip planned
with the Sail Club and Our Paddling Club at Bimini Basin at Four Freedoms Park,
Cape Coral launching at 12:00pm until 4:00pm. Lynette
is working on getting together a Mound Key Trip sometimes in May. We will get
the information on the calendar as soon as it is set. We
need trips to be set for May. Our
calendar has nothing to show for next month. Please contact Diane or Rusty if
you wish to set a trip. Diane
went over the idea of another camping trip. As to now it is just and idea. We
went over trip rules, membership fees and joining ACA (American Canoe
Association) for the new members.
Dorii
Glass brought two logos for approval and between both of them and suggestions
from the club members we will have a logo for the club real soon. With that we
went over ideas of getting tee shirts. Steve
Catron talked about Chris (his friend) who has a website for the weather in Cape
Coral. He is working on setting up weather cams in different locations in the
Cape and will be setting one up at Backwater Outfitters in Matlacha soon. This
would be a great resource to get weather information before you go boating.
You can check out his website at www.capeweather.com.
Diane
suggested doing presentations at each monthly meetings. The meeting adjourned at 8:17 pm. And we ventured to Bert’s. Please plan on joining us at the next meeting. Minutes taken by: Dorii Glass Secretary Gulf
Coast Backwater Paddlers P.O.
Box 100913 Cape
Coral, FL 33910
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