Quote:
Originally Posted by Cameron Swift
Unfortunately, this is me too. A horrible bully of an instructor when I was 6 or 7 plus being forced to jump into the deep end put me off water completely. It gave me a slight phobia for a few years as a kid too.
This thread has scared/shamed me into wanting to learn soon though. Especially because I want my 5 year old boy to have that ability.
Here's a quick, dumb question. Neither my wife or I can swim, and we had been looking to take our son out on a canoe on the reservoir. Are life jackets enough if we did happen to fall in? Or should we just scrap the idea altogether?
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I probably spend ~80 days a year on the lake in living Alberta, which I think is pretty good.
In terms of going out with a life jacket if you don't know how to swim, I think you should all go to a shallow calm water first and try floating for a minute.
Even floating in an Adult life jacket takes a little bit of control, with absolutely no swimming skills you need to focus on keeping your chest facing up, and just pushing backwards with your arms and feet to move, that's why baby life jacks have no floatation on the back, they always end up chest up.
If you are canoeing on something with a current, and happen to go in the water it is also important to point your feet down stream. You would rather have your foot hit a rock or some driftwood than your head.