Gear Bag Stohlquist FreeRyde Semi Drytop
Latex neck gaskets are still the driest way to go in a paddling garment, but pulling them on can be like re-enacting your exit from the womb, with the same attendant risks: suffocation, bad hair and a red-faced look that only a mother could love. The new Stohlquist FreeRyde Semi Drytop has all the high- end drytop features minus that infernal gasket—three-layer waterproof-breathable fabric, taped seams, waist tunnel and latex wrist gaskets. The FreeRyde’s smooth neoprene collar is way more comfortable than latex. It seals well on a narrower range of neck sizes than latex—the fatter your neck, the drier the FreeRyde will be. The FreeRyde is cut for a wide range of movement in the shoulders, and the material is super-lightweight, stuffable and supple. The FreeRyde is good for the gasket-phobic, and for temperate spring and fall days when a heavier drytop feels like overkill. $210 US; $294 Cdn.
www.stohlquist.com. —TS
Walden Waldies Solz Sport Sandals
“The thong is often maligned and dismissed as inappropriate footgear,” writes shoe scholar Cameron Kippen. “Truth is it is the oldest and most enduring shoe of all time.” Just go hike in the Andes and watch the porters jog past you with their tree-trunk legs tapering down to a pair of huaraches cobbled together from old tires. Replace those tire treads and rubber straps with heavy-duty thermoplastic rubber and non-rot polypropylene webbing and you’ve got the latest entry into the sport sandal market, Solz from South Africa. True to huarache heritage, Solz sandals have a nubbly sole that’s heavier than most but it pays on the trail. The multiple instep straps support well. Several styles available— we like the ones without the straps in front of the toes. $85 Cdn.
www.patri-
otimports.com. —TS
Shred Ready Shredder and Super Scrappy
The Shredder fit me beautifully right out of the box, so I immediately appropriated the review model and I’ve been gleefully bumping down summer-dry class II rock gardens upside down ever since. Fit is a personal thing but a good adjustment system is key. Shred Ready helmets come in different shell sizes and include strips of foam of differing thickness that Velcro into the shell. You get a custom fit without messing around with contact cement. Both helmets include retention harnesses that scoop around the back of your noggin to keep the unit snug and very resistant to sliding forward. The Shredder has the excellent, low-profile, ratcheted H.O.T. (Hold on Tight) Lock system and the Super Scrappy includes the much beefier H.O.G (Hand of God). Both let you twiddle the har- ness tight or loose to match your white-knuckle factor at the moment. The visored Super Scrappy is an affordable plastic-shelled helmet with the slick look of composite. It can be worn forward and backward and fits a pair of com- plimentary rubber earflaps à la WW I flying ace. Super Scrappy: $112 Cdn, $80 US. Shredder: $154 Cdn, $110 US.
www.shredready.com. —TS
It’s taken me almost five years to earn what you might call acceptance in the small town of Quadeville, Ontario. It took the locals a while to warm up to my kayaks, floral-print shirts, imported car and earring. I’d just progressed to the point where the men would nod in my general direction. Then one day I walked into the general store wearing my sun-faded pink rubber clogs. “They were red when I got them,” I pleaded, breaking the silence. Originally I bought my red Waldies to stuff into my boat and slip over my neoprene socks when walking on shore.
They’re perfect—feather light, brightly coloured, floating and, best of all, cheap. But standing in the store, I needed a better reason to be wearing such ridiculous, if not a little feminine, footwear. I scanned the room looking for the fella I knew the best and kicked off my Waldies in his direction. “Try ‘em on. You’ll like them.” While he was reluctantly unlacing his work boots, I launched defensively into an explanation of their benefits: funky styling, odour-resistant, spongy comfort. Nothing.
“Did I mention the massaging sole with pleasure nubs?” Eyes widened under foam-and-mesh baseball caps. “Pleasure nubs eh? Do they come in any other colour?” Available in black, red (not recommended), green, blue and yellow. $ 24.55 Cdn, $17.95 US.
www.waldensports.com. —SM
40
www.rapidmag.com
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52