Today I finished carving my first homebuilt paddle -- built from Chuck Holst's plans that you can find in a .pdf file somewhere on this message board, or on (I think) Ross Leidy's web site.

It was phenomenally easy (discounting the quite a bit of sweat that was flying), and quite fun.
I started with just a plain old cedar 2x4 for about $5 (although I did pick through a stack to try to find one with fewer knots and such).
I variously used a mortising gauge, marking knife, metal straightedge, jack plane, finger plane, coping saw, back saw, and spokeshave.

It was quite fun and rewarding to see the curls of cedar cleanly peeling off, and of course the smell is wonderful. (By the way, does anyone have any suggestions on what to do with about half a yard of wood shavings?)

And, being that I finished shaping and sanding it and still had a couple of hours of daylight left, I just HAD to go try it out for a few minutes at a local lakeside park. Results: I'm stunned! Even though I slapped it together fairly carelessly (this WAS just going to be a prototype), it works wonderfully. Sliding my upper hand up onto the blade provides for great leverage and makes a sweep stroke feel effortless.

It does suffer from a loud "plop" as the paddle tip enters the water, and it does sling an awful lot of water down the blade and onto my hands, sleeves, and spray skirt, and it does feel a slight bit bendy (though only when pushing off a solid object, not when paddling).

So, a couple of questions:
* I believe I recall reading that modifying one's technique will reduce the "plop" entry, but I don't recall where. Was that on this board somewhere?
* Does anyone have any suggestions on the slinging-water problem?
* will it be effective to glass this paddle for added strength? or would any forces that would break a bare paddle also crack the center of a glassed one?