How far to paddle per day?

I am doing a canoe trip in September and am curious about how far to plan for each days paddling. All in our group are very active/athletic with high tolerance for discomfort. What is an average distance considering flat water, little wind.

I'm not in the best of shapes and I took my canoe for a ride on the river last weekend. I ended up paddling over 15 km and I had been out on the water for around 12 hours. Alot of this time was for fishing though and I guess I must have paddled around 3-4 hours max..

I suppose someone in good shape could easily go for 25-30 km in a day...

Sounds good - but try reading Don Starkell's Paddle to the Amazon! At times they managed 50+ miles in a day - and sustained the journey for nearly 2 years (knocking out their waiting time)

I would have to say you can generally do 3-6km/hr. But it's a big _depends_. If you're paddling up a river take off a click or two, against the wind another,etc. Don't just look at time on the water, also look at setup and takedown of your campsite everyday, mealtimes etc. All those factors eat up your day and if you're too focused on keeping a hard pace you can' enjoy the scenery.

I would say 25-30 km in a day is a good pace at 5 or 6 hours of paddling. But also know where other camp sites are in case the weather turns sour or you're not travelling as fast as planned.

Alex

Depends. Upstream or down? How fast is the flow? I've done an easy 20 or 30 miles in one day (canoe for 20 and kayak for 30), but that was with a current and either hiding in back channels from wind or having little of it.

But on another trip, the river was so low and so slow that it was a fairly ugly 10 miles a day.

My wife and I figure on an average distance traveled of 2 miles per hour. This sounds slow but it includes stopping for lunch, and two short breaks during an eight hour day trip. This is the average distance over the water for several day trips on a large inland lake with moderate winds and no current or tide. If your destination is 10 miles away, it will take you an average of 5 hours to get there including time to stop and eat and time to stop and rest or whatever. This would not apply to river travel. We are fairly experienced paddlers with fast, decked canoes for boats. We could cover 10 miles in two hours if we had to....but why rush? I have a couple of pics of our boats on http://www.geocities.com/new_old_boats?oldboat/ index.htm

You may have a *tolerance* for discomfort, but is that what you *want*? If you want to have a voyageur workout, then go for it. But if you want a vacation trip, then plan it that way.

I do not know what to suggest for you, but set-up and break-down times plus meals equals 3-4 hours per day(?) maybe more. Plus sleep 8 plus relax 2 leaves maximum 10 for paddling, and weather or other factors will cut that a bit. So 8 hours gives you 24 km /day with no portage time. (Portage time 1 km/hr if double-crossing, 2 km/hr if single-crossing??)

Those are verrrrrrry rough rules of thumb.