Dress For Conquest

You've probably been wondering what to wear for canoe trips, "What will keep me warm? What will keep me dry? What will make me look good?" Well, you've come to the right place. It is time we talked about canoeing garb so that you can be in style for the upcoming canoeing season. Since I am frequently asked about my own outfits, I assume that people want my advice, so here it is.

You've seen the ads: Patagonia, Kokatat, L.L. Bean catalogs. There are handsome men and beautiful women all dressed up in the latest high-tech clothing with colorful designs. THIS IS NOT FOR YOU! First of all, you're not handsome enough or beautiful enough to be wearing that stuff. Second, you can't afford it unless you sell several of your boats. Thirdly, the styles are just simply wrong. They assume you want to be wearing up-to-the-minute 90's style clothing. And worse, by assuming this with enough money dumped into advertising they are making some of you actually believe that you want to wear up-to-the-minute 90's style clothing.

The simple truth is: Canoeing clothing hasn't changed styles since 1894 when raccoon hats went out of style in favor of the wool felt hat.

I need to warn you that there is a conspiracy among the clothing manufacturers and they are attempting to do the same thing to canoeing that they did to skiing: make lots of money on it. They do this by printing "paddling" in front of the name of the item and doubling the price.

Bubba, the Adirondack hunting guide, would tell you there is no place for this new gear except in the colorful magazine ads. Bubba and his clients greeted us as we were packing our canoes for a weekend of drinking ourselves into a stupor while camped on an island in a blizzard during late October a few years ago. Bubba knew how to dress appropriately for an occasion; he was well outfitted in a blaze orange coat and red plaid wool pants with rubber bottomed, leather topped boots. Granted, he and his party were a little discourteous to me and our party when I foolishly asked, "Is this deer season?" But they were good enough to give us some advise on what clothing is "in" and what is not. Three of us wearing acceptable canoeing outfits passed inspection, but one, the one who had on a dry suit worth more than my truck, was told that his clothing was not appropriate canoeing attire. I think the way he put it was, "What the hell kind of clown outfit is that anyway?"

Don't ever get caught in an embarrassing situation like that. You may not be lucky enough to have Bubba come running down to the lake as you're about to shove off and ask if you can give his truck a jump start.

So how does one attain a look of distinction? Follow these guidelines and you, too, can be a well-dressed paddler.

The most important piece of clothing you will wear paddling is, of course, the hat. The hat will keep you warm, keep you dry, shield you from the sun, and bail your boat. Its prime functionality, though, comes into effect at the end of the trip when you lift the canoe onto your shoulders to carry it to the car. That is when a day's worth of water, mud, seaweed, and fish hooks fall on your head and attempt to find their way down the back of your neck. You really love your hat then. You're really glad you don't have a good hat then. This is the primary reason new hats are new for only one trip. Hats can't take too much love.

One must not worry about a little mud on the hat. If it gets old quickly, fine. Develop this attitude. The hat also must look right on you and that is how it gets to look right. You can spend a lot of money on hats and some will look better than others, but no matter how much you spend you can't buy the character that develops from wearing the hat. It's the character that counts, not how much you spend, how neat it looks, or what color it is.

Speaking of color, we must discuss your color combination. Choosing your proper color scheme is an important part of getting yourself dressed for conquest. This choice cannot be made indiscriminately by amateurs; certain colors will complement and others distract. Individuals will vary differently based upon subtle characteristics such as skin tone, hair color, eyes, what part of breakfast is still in your beard, etc. It takes a trained marketeer to pick proper color schemes, or another expert. I understand that for a nominal fee, you can obtain a color analysis. There are people who will study your skin tone and give you psychological tests and advise you what colors are best for you. You pay them for this service. HA! Do people actually do this? In the country that made the pet rock popular, I suppose it makes sense.

Lacking access to a trained marketeer and having enough sense to forego a color analysis, you can simply ask any woman, she will know. The problem with this is that you may then be committed to follow her advice. And the advice may not end at only the color scheme. So forget that too. Keep it simple, use green and/or brown.

Any shade of green and/or brown will be perfect, don't try to make them match - it's too much effort and the green hat and the green pants will be different shades anyway in the daylight. Wear a brown shirt in between (tan is close enough). This will prove you're not trying to make the outfit match. Who cares? (Develop this attitude.) Bubba uses this method, only his colors are blaze orange and red plaid.

Okay, this may be a bit too simplistic for many of you. Perhaps you need to make it a bit more complicated. Besides, you have to buy something that is for canoeing just to get in the spirit. You want to be different, not just another green and/or brown canoer. I've been there, I've had these feelings and I've found a method that works wonderfully. Buy a croaker, or is it a pair of croakers - anyway, a band you attach to glasses so they will stay on your head when you've capsized. You'll find that croakers don't come in plain colors. Pick one out, buy it, and there! You've got your color scheme. Now just buy all your other clothing to match.

Shirts:   You'll need a shirt.

Pants:   You'll need these too for most occasions. They have to be wool.

Underwear:   Be careful here. This depends on whether your wife is watching or not. If not grab the colored ones, after all you may end up changing in the privacy of a public parking lot, so you want to look good. If she is watching, better not, she'll get suspicious and your canoeing days will be over.

Shoes:   I'm a bit disgusted with myself. I broke down in a weak moment last year and bought a pair of river boots. They only cost $60. I suppose that's because they're called "river" boots not "canoeing" boots. Otherwise they might have been $80. They're made from fifty cents worth of neoprene and fifty cents worth of Taiwanese labor. They are not comfortable. They are really not warm. They don't give a lot of support for walking on rocks along a river bank. They actually look pretty stupid. And they really stink when cooked in the hot sun in the back of my truck! Bubba would not approve.

My previous boots were regular hiking boots, seven inches high or so, uninsulated. They were comfortable, warm (with wool socks), and suitable for wearing while walking over rocks with a canoe on my shoulders. I once trudged a two-mile portage on the Missinaibi through knee deep mud on with these on. I had to throw them away afterwards, but they got me through the portage. The river boots would have been sucked off my feet within the first fifty steps. (And that was the grey mud! The brown mud was worse and those stretches of black mud even worse yet!)

Hiking boots do tend to get blown out quickly with extended periods of walking in water, being crinkled into the toe to instep kneeling position, and having mud baked onto them in the sun. The stitching came undone on one pair of mine after three or four years of use as river boots. This was a problem for a while because sand and stones would find access into the boot through the hole. The first couple of attempts I made to repair them didn't last half a day. The thread simply broke. Then I sewed them up using fly fishing backing line. This is fluorescent yellow twenty pound line. It not only holds, it looks outrageous! It's great. It's better than those stupid looking river boots.

Heed this advice and you, too, can become a picturesque canoer who is prepared to conquer the rivers in a fashionable and elegant way. Whenever you buy a new item of clothing for canoeing, ask yourself, "Would Bill Mason wear this?"