: Etienne makes some good points.
: The trade-off is between having the deck right in your lap (good)
: vs being able to enter/exit easily (also good).
: Unless you have excellent balance and a good sculling brace, you'll
: likely have trouble with cowboy/scramble re-entry with a shorter
: cockpit.
: The sort of rescues that they teach in most kayak classes are all
: easier with a longer cockpit, in my limited experience.
: Playing with re-entry in my Outer Island (rim OD 25 x 19) is a lot
: different than with a boat like the NDK Romany (rim OD 35 x 18)

: Things to think about if you are interested in getting into your
: boat 'butt-first', or exiting 'feet first':
: Seat/backband position
: Leg length
: Flexibility of paddler
: and cockpit length.

: You can check out http://www.skirtfit.com/ to see the cockpit RIM
: (not cutout) sizes for many kayaks.

Hi John,

The way I rationalised through it in the end, to end up doing all my cockpits smaller, though not ridiculously so, was to ask myself which way up I intended and expected to be in the boat 99.99 percent of the time, and build with the comforts of that preference in mind.

Well of course the answer, for me anyway, was THE RIGHT WAY UP. So I build my boats with an optimist's attitude and smaller cockpits.

Et