October 18: Notus: An exercise using FREE!Ship: Using the Notus Racing and Cruising Canoe as the subject, this tutorial shows you how to import offsets into Free!Ship and create decks and sails. Also, included is a spreadsheet to make offset import easy, and the imported plans for the Notus for free.

October 17: A RSS feed is a simple way for you to keep up-to-date with new articles posted on Nessmuking.com, and it is very easy to use. First you need to download a rss reader. I use Thunderbird. It's free and handles my email also. Then create a new News and Blogs subscription, press the XML button and copy and paste the address into the form in Thunderbird, and it does the rest. After it is set up, anytime a new article is posted on this site, it will appear in your rss reader.

October 16: Building a Perfect Kayak: The Initial Test: Finally, after all that work, I get a chance to test my kayak under perfect conditions.

October 16: Review Terramar Transport Micro-Mesh T-Shirt: A review of one of the best T-shirts in the world. The Terramar Transport Micro-Mesh T-Shirt is reviewed.

October 15: Interview with a Solo Canoeist Part Two: Part Two of the interview between solo canoeist, Bryan Hansel, and himself. This one is after the trip was finished.

October 13: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Ten:In this episode, I install rubber hatch covers with plastic hatch rims into my cedar strip kayak, and, finally, join the kayak together.

October 11: Forward Paddling a Kayak: Visiting author, Jakob Jelling, writes about how easy and important a good forward stroke is when paddling a kayak.

October 10: Interview with a Solo Canoeist: During a 9 day, 200-mile solo canoe trip, solo canoeist, Bryan Hansel, interviewed himself. His trip started in Voyager National park and ended on Lake Superior.

September 30: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Nine: With the outside of the kayak finished, the work progresses to the inside of the kayak, plus I make a massive cut into the deck and it turns out great.

September 22: Ration Planning NOLS Style for Camping: Exploring NOLS system of menu planning for an canoeing expedition across the Boundary Water. This article shows a NOLS plan for a twelve day trip, and discuses how well it worked.

September 6: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Eight: Block plane in hand, the build progresses from rough kayak to smooth sanded finish, and finally to fiberglassing. Plus a VR Tour image of my kayak and shop. Also, check out the VR Tour of the kayak build.

September 4: Lake Superior Time Lapse:Ahhh. The perfect place to rest your soul. View a time lapse image of the waves on Lake Superior.

August 28: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Seven: Stripping the deck, a deck redesign, center of buoyancy, cockpit placement, and more.

August 23: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Six: In the six installment, the hull of the kayak is stripped with cedar and pine. And a simple design is used on the bottom of the hull.

August 16: Music for Paddling or Building Boats: Yep, I'm a little passionate about music. I love to listen to it even when I'm miles from home in the middle of nowhere, and here are some of my favorite albums. If you only buy one album this year, make it one off of this list and you won't be disappointed.

August 16: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Five: In the fifth installment, the forms are laid out on plywood, and they look too small, so it's back to the computer to redesign the kayak. Finished with the redesign the forms are cut and put on the strongback for the first time. See what it looks like.

August 12: Building a Perfect Kayak: Part Four: Pine? Learn why pine makes a good building material for building kayaks, and how to rip strips without a table saw, and a jig for bead and coves.

August 12: Vaude Hobb Creek: The Hobb Creek first built for canyoneering and spelunking makes its way to Minnesota. How does it stack up?

August 11: Some news from Bell Canoe Works: Four new models: A new 12' Rob Roy, a composite version of the Chestnut Prospector! (and eventually a Royalex version), and composites of the Vermonter(designed by Jim Henry as an updated Explorer), and get this!!!! a composite Yellowstone Solo (Cliff has endorsed this as his new favorite canoe.) And the great news for those of us who like to beat our boats and have light weight. Blackgold, the strongest laminate on the market, has now been made 6 to 7 pounds lighter per canoe. A new trim on their plastic boats drops the weight by 4 pounds.

August 9: Reviews of Boat Building Books: Concise reviews of 19, count them, 19 boat building books. This list will get you started building boats of your own. It's easy just check out my building log for my latest kayak.

August 9: Down the Mississippi River: In August 2004, two friends started a kayaking trip down the Mississippi River. They planned on paddling 560 miles in 15 days, and one of them - me - made it. The other quit early. In this personal essay, written shortly after the trip, I explore the meaning of friendship and how expeditions can ruin them if you're not careful.

August 8: Win a Custom Handcrafted PaddleNow is your chance to win a custom made handcrafted paddle built from laminated ash and cedar. This paddle will be built to fit you and your paddling style. Just enter the Famous 35 Day Challenge. In addition to winning a great handcrafted paddle by entering you will be helping other canoeist and kayakers buy gear based on simplicity.

August 7: Part Three of Building a Perfect Kayak: In the third installment, numbers are calculated and entered into the KAPER drag prediction spreadsheet. Remember, you can keep up to date on new episodes by using Nessmukings news feed. If you don't know how to use an RSS reader, email me and I'll get you started.

August 4: Part Two of Building a Perfect Kayak: After a couple of days of work on the kayak design, I discover a secret about the Hulls boat design program that makes using it for cedar strip kayak building much easier. In this installment, learn how to output perfectly aligned building stations from cedar strip building using Hulls.

July 28: Building a Perfect Kayak: My Adventure in Kayak Design and Cedar Strip Building. As long as I can remember, I've always wanted to build a kayak based on my own design. After a first try, I get back at it armed with the knowledge gleamed from all my boat building and paddling experiences.

July 26: Review: Orikaso Fold Flat Bowl:A review of an innovative new product designed to help save weight in the kitchen, a place where saving weight is needed.

July 8: Reveiw: Big Agnes Seedhouse -- Update!!: After a month long and wet trip to the interior mountains of the US, this tent receives an update. Find out why you should never buy this tent.

July 8: BWCA: Insider Tips: After a month long trip to the interior mountains of the US, I'm back to Canoe Country in northern Minnesota. In this article, I discuss three tips that will make your next couple of trips to the BWCAW easier on the wallet and then mind.

May 27: Bryan's WorkShop in 3D: This is a 360 degree Virtual Tour of my workshop for boat building. It's shot with a prototype wooden panohead that I've developed. I will eventually turn this head into carbonfiber.

May 25: Free Aleutian Baidarka Kayak Plans: Free plans for building an Aleutian Baidarka Kayak using the Hulls boat design program.

May 15: Lost and Found: What to do when you find something in the Woods: When you find an expensive item in the wilderness, you may be tempted to claim salvage rights, but to learn what you really should do, read this article.

May 13: How to Choose a Tent: A tent is your home away from home. It needs to be waterproof, durable, but most of all it has to be easy to set up. There are many types of tents and which one is right for you depend on many factors. Will you be backpacking, bike touring, or family camping? How many people will be using it? Do you need to use it in winter or will you camp in windy and exposed conditions? By considering a few factors you pick select the perfect tent for your needs..

May 13: How to Choose a Sleeping Bag: With so many models on the market, how do you pick one or two or maybe three? A simple article down to earth article which let you know about how to choose a sleeping bag.

May 12: It is confirmed. In my Canoecopia 2005: Trip Report in mentioned that a big buy out was in the works. I received confirmation today: Confluence Acquires Watermark Paddlesports. This combines two of the largest paddlesport companies in America. It will be interesting to see how their main brands play out. I.e. Dagger, Wilderness Systems, and Perception. Also, will Mad River start to produce old Dagger canoes, and will Bell still produce the Dagger boats that they have the rights to? Stay tuned.

May 11: A Gear List: Traveling lightly requires analyzing your gear. This is my basic list.

April 10: Make Your Own Inuksuk Review: Make Your Own Inuksuk by Mary Wallace reviewed.

April 2: Good Sh!t Canoe Works T-Shirt: Good Sh!t Canoe Works is one of my many projects, and now you can buy a T-Shirt with the logo and slogan from the GSCW. The Slogan is "Don't be caught on the crapper when the wind blows up. Be traveling with a Good Sh!t Canoe." The shirts are $15 and you can buy them at the link.

March 14th: Canoecopia 2005: Trip Report: A quick review of the Canoecopia event in Madison, WI.

February 18th: iRiver i799: This mp3 player happens to be one of the best for paddlers wanting to bring music with them on their next trip. This is also the first fully revised Nesmuking.com XHTML and CSS page.

February 17th: Free Search Tool BarNow Nessmuking.com is offering a free search tool bar that you can add to your browser.

February 17th: Book Reviews The book review page is updated with links to amazon.com. These books are must haves, and if you buy them from the link, you help support this site. Nessmuking.com receives a small amount of each sale.

February 2nd: An RSS feed is a simple way for you to keep up-to-date with new articles posted on Nessmuking.com, and it is very easy to use. First you need to download a rss reader. I use Thunderbird. It's free and handles my email also. Then create a new News and Blogs subscription, press the XML button and copy and paste the address into the form in Thunderbird, and it does the rest. You can check out Thunderbird and Firefox by clicking the links provided here. Plus, Firefox displays everything correctly according to XHTML and CSS standards, so you can make sure that Nessmuking.com is displayed correctly for you. Enjoy. Valid RSS

January 31st: Some New Year's Resolutions. After a month of reflecting on last year and my accomplishments, I've come up with a few resolutions and paddling goals for 2005. I'm sharing them with the world, so now I have to actually do them.

January 25th: Nessmuking: Your Paddling Partners and Having Successful Trips. A new Nessmuking essay about how to take care of pretrip planning in order to have a successful expedition.

January 13th: Disaster at The Saskatchewan Crossing. Robert N Pruden writes about a harrowing disaster on a trip he took several years ago, and he reports about the important lessons learned. What you read here could save your life.

December 27th: Get Bent.Many paddlers often wonder about those funny looking paddles with bent shafts. Find out why they are using them in a simple and down to earth explanation.

December 12th: Canoeing the Namekagon, St. Croix, and Mississippi Rivers. Experienced canoeist, Bill Collet paddled solo down these rivers to Dubuque, IA in the Summer of 2004. He gives a detailed journal of his experience. By the way, I shared a campsite with him on this trip, and I receive a small cameo in his journal.

December 12th:Boundary Waters Solo Fall 2004. A slightly slow trip inspired a trip journal about noticing the details and taking the time to relax. Along with the journal, haiku and pictures spice up the pages.

December 1st: Review Big Agnes Seedhouse SL 2: This lightweight tent for two is put through the ringer on several trips; two hundred miles in the Boundary Waters and 560 miles kayaking the Mississippi River. Read if it comes out ahead.

November 30th:How to Pick a Bell Solo Canoe: Having worked for a Bell Canoe Works retailer for seven years, I was asked this question often. I own two models of their solo canoes and one of my best friends owns a third model, so I've spent time in all three models. I'll give you an easy to follow explanation of which canoe to load up and take home.