warm. Lake shows me a sculpture created by combining the fire- scorched remains of Sterling’s hand-tools. A pair of pliers, saw blades, drill bits, clamps, a hammer head, shears and a caulking gun—all charred by extreme heat—have been carefully welded together into the form of a kayak. “Friends wanted to do something for Sterling, but they didn’t


have money to contribute—so they made this beautiful sculpture,” Lake beams. Marsha relates how a local businessman called her out of the blue


soon after the fire. He offered to drop off a shipping container for them at no charge—he was in the container business and said that he himself had been through a fire. He reasoned that they’d need somewhere to store things while they rebuilt. “I told him I didn’t think that we had anything left to put in a


container,” Marsha tells me. Still, she thanked him and took his number. The container now sits behind their house and is filling up with some of the supplies needed for the new shop.


REG LAKE IN THE TEMPORARY


HOME OF STERLING KAYAKS. PHOTO: ALEX MATTHEWS


DONALSON GREW UP MAKING THINGS—notably building experimental aircraft with his father, whose military career lead to frequent moves all over the world, including stints in Japan, Germany, France and across the United States. Donalson was a 13-year-old Boy Scout when he built his first kayak with his dad—a Folbot Sporty ordered from South Carolina. Over the years, kayak building became a hobby, and he made many more using plywood or space frame construction. Boat building took a backseat to skiing in the ‘70s, with Donalson


becoming the national amputee skiing champion in 1972. Now in the Belligham area, he was with the U.S. Ski Team, working with Allsop ski equipment and traveling to alpine resorts around the world. But by the early ‘80s, Donalson was once again interested in


kayaks. Frustrated with trying to find a kayak that fit him properly, he constructed his own. Researching materials and construction methods, this time he chose composites, building his first fiberglass kayak. He also built himself a one-foot-controlled rudder system. The first commercially available Sterling sea kayak debuted in


2006. Called the Ice Kap, it was a modified version of Nimbus Kayaks founder Steve Schleicher’s Kap Farvel. The Ice Kap was a small, low-volume craft, so it made sense


that the next model in the Sterling line would be a somewhat larger kayak. Donalson developed this boat in-house, working with Greenland-style expert Warren Williamson and well-known West Coast instructor and Kayak Academy founder George Gronseth. After much prototyping and extensive testing, the Illusion was launched in 2007. The Grand Illusion followed, providing similar performance but with a still larger fit. While each of these models catered to paddlers of a different size, Sterling also offered custom cut-down versions that allowed


even greater fine-tuning. In addition to these three trim choices, three different coaming options further tailored the kayak to a specific paddler. Mixing and matching these options provided a level of


customization that the big kayak manufacturers simply couldn’t match. Rather than attempting mass production, Donalson chose to remain small, focusing on performance-driven designs and producing just 80 or so boats a year. The design focus for Sterling Kayaks was also becoming well


established—above all, Donalson wanted his boats to provide the highest degree of control. They must be highly responsive to input, whether traveling in a straight line, carving tight turns or surfing waves. Furthermore, they should perform in all conditions from calm water to dynamic high wind mayhem. The next model—the Reflection—would prove to be a


watershed design for Sterling, but the story of its inception is as unlikely as the events that followed in its wake. Since the debut of the Ice Kap, Lake had become a committed


Sterling supporter, attracted by the company’s focus and Donalson’s extensive knowledge of composites. “I’m prone to playing on the front edge of things, so I like


being around the building process,” says Lake, a self-described “gizmologist” and machinist by trade. “With Sterling, we can spend a lot more time staying with the question, rather than having to rush to one possible solution.” Donalson, in turn, quickly recognized how important Lake’s four


decades of kayaking experience were to the testing process and to developing innovative new sea kayaks.


www.adventurekayakmag.com 45


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  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64