17 . 11 . 18
At the end of last year, James’ dad Andrew turned sixty. We’d been developing, slowly but surely, our range of flat-water exploration stand-up paddleboards ready for release this summer, and James’ mum wanted to surprise her husband with a special gift; sending him on a surprise stand-up paddleboard workshop course with his son was the perfect present. Andrew started paddleboarding when he and Trudy first moved to Cornwall and lived in the waterfront village of Flushing, the other side of the estuary from Falmouth, and together they explored the creeks and inlets of the Carrick Roads on the south coast. James and his mum therefore hatched a plan that would see James make his Dad a bespoke wooden paddle to present to him on his birthday, as the “ticket” for the workshop week that Trudy was sending him on. They surprised him at a family dinner, and just a week later Andrew was in the workshop here assembling the framework for his 10’6” paddleboard applying clamps to rail strips.