I'm after some advice on boats. I know the classic advice is demo, demo, demo, but I've a slight predicament. I've paddled larger, old school boats with displacement hulls for a while and recently got an old space cadet. I'm loving it and learning loads, my paddling is coming on leaps and bounds, but I know at some point I'm going to need a larger boat for harder rivers. The lack of foot rest is rather scary on drops for instance! However I'm not sure I want to go back to paddling things with displacement hulls. I'm UK based, which means that lots of our rivers are low volume. I've run easy class 4 and would like something I can get solid on 4 and maybe do the odd 5 in. I'm about 80kg.

So what boat to buy? I can't see any shop let me throwing a shiny new boat down a creek and to be honest I'm not sure I know what makes a good river runner/creeker, certainly not enough to tell on flat water. I know both connect 30 and bad arse outfitting is nice. One option would be to buy something like a burn, big and loads of volume, but I don't want to lose the ability to play. I'll be river running more then creaking, but want the option open to me, but I still want something that's fun. This made me think about something like the ammo or the hoss. In my space cadet I really struggle to paddle up stream, because of its length. Would the ammo give me enough length to move up stuff? One advantage the hoss has is that its considerably cheaper and I can get a bit of a discount which would make it slightly cheaper new then I could get a burn or ammo second hand?

Your suggestions would be very welcome, along with any corrections of misconceptions I may have!

hey there yea it is demo demo demo.
i think you should look at the jackson hero it is a river runner but with a lot of volume
and its able to surf and spin if your skilled
it has a great out fitting

dan

sorry if theres any crapy spelling

JK Hero
BS Scud
Pyranha Ammo

All of these are good river runners that will play

If you are looking to get into some steep stuff I would probably urge you to go with a full on creeker

Burn
Rocker
Mystic
Solo
Jefe

if it were me, id keep the space cadet.. and play your brains out then get a full on creeker to go out and fire up the tougher stuff...

I have a project 62 to play and creek in my burn.

I have to agree with Laddie, but I would add the BigEZ from Wavesport on the list of playrunners. Maybe not the newest on the market but in my opinion not outdated. You might also want to check out Prijon Wizard. Good plastic.

And good luckB)

Sorry u have to agree with me:laugh: