Hello Everyone,

My name is John and i'm new. New to kayaking (only been twice in rentals). New to the idea of building my kayak. I've been saving up my money to get into kayaking for a while now. Just when i was getting ready to go pick one out, i stumbled across Ray Jardines pages about building kayaks. Now i've been scouring the web for the last week, including reading all the messages here. I'm a big guy, 275 lbs, I like to go camping, and my son is 140lb (age 12). To me this seems to add up to almost 600 lbs capacity (he isn't done growing). The simple answer would sem to be to start with a boat like the Osprey 2 seater, or the Guillemot "Double". or some similar double/tripple.
Pardon all the background, my question is roughly this. How sever are class I and class II rapids. Will we alway have to portage this boat around them? We live between Nashville and Knoxville and while there are lakes we can use the kayak on, this area of tennessee has some marvelous rivers Like the Big South Fork with camping opportunities. I don't understand if these seakayaks can even make the bends where there aren't rapids. Any information would be greatly appreciated, including alternatives.

If you read this far, I already owe you for your time.
Thanks,
John