boring
while this thread has gone on way too long, and is quite boring, i find a need to add my 2 boring cents:
so...yeah, i use straps, and i'd say it is pretty clear that most use straps, but a lot of old dogs use rope (i'm guessing cause cam straps weren't really sold at kayak shops back in the 70s...) - which leads me to a semi-funny story -
went boating this year with my crew. mostly 30 somethings doing 4's and trying to step into 5's - we ran a local 4 run around here for the first time this year, and in doing so, we met up with an old dog to shuttle. Now...this dude was what i call a "master" - mainly, a super competent boater that runs V's. - he knew the run well (was prepared to solo it), and had obviously been boating while i was still pulling bra straps and trying to figure out if a "boner" was actaully a bone. so we did our run and took out, and prepared to shuttle back up to the put in (BTW - 1 swim for my crew in the lower bony section) - and it was pretty obvious to me that the master dude had had enough of us young losers. Towards the end of the run, he pretty much disappeared, and continued on to the takeout without us, which would normally be 100% cool, except that on this run, one can continue downstream, thru hard V and VI territory. So we all finally pulled out, with this dude gone, and start trucking down to where we think his truck is. He eventually drives up, and we start loading stuff up. Being an old dog master, he throws the rope over his truck to my bud, who is staring at it wondering how to rig. At this point, old dude comes over, and ties the shit up, the whole time telling us what a bunch of idiots we are, and how there was "life before cam straps" - obviously, we had no respect from master dude, and he was quite disappointed with us non-master colorado boaters.
so....there's no real point here (that i can make out anyways) - other than it is still funny for me to think of this master dude, and how he was so disappointed with my bro for not tying the shit up to his specifications... - i guess maybe the lessons might be twofold:
1) learn to rig shit with the truckers hitch or otherwise, so that when you end up with an old dog, you might gain some respect. or
2) if you're an old dog, don't get super elitist about non-old dogs not tying things like you like. i mean really, if your boating experience was more recent, you would also not be aware of the ideal rigging mechanisms.
That would be like me making fun of some new climber for not knowing how to use a figure 8, as now people mostly use ATC's or a variety of new devices (point #2 here)...