Reviving the Spirit of SSTIKS: A Conversation with Paul Steinberg and Noy Davis

In this episode of The Dubcast with Dubside, Andrew sits down with Paul Steinberg and Noy Davis, coordinators of the South Sound Traditional Inuit Kayaking Symposium—better known as SSTIKS. After a five-year hiatus, SSTIKS is back, and Paul and Noy share what it’s taken to bring this beloved gathering of Greenland-style paddlers back to life. They talk about the history of the event, the joys and challenges of rope gymnastics, why kids make the best rope rollers, and the rich community of kayak builders, rollers, and storytellers that have kept the tradition alive in the Pacific Northwest. With reflections on mentors, DIY kayaks, and Deadfish Polo, this episode is both a tribute and a rallying cry for the next generation of traditional paddlers.

LINKS:

South Sound Traditional Inuit Kayaking Symposium (SSTIKS)

Palo’s Wedding

Transcript

ANDREW:
Hello friends and welcome. You are listening to the Dubcast with Dubside. I'm Andrew Elizaga and I'll be your host for this special episode where I'm going to be talking with Paul Steinberg and Noy Davis, coordinators of the South Sound Traditional Inuit Kayak Symposium, also known as SSTIKS.

Welcome, Paul and Noy. 

PAUL:
Thank you, Andrew.

NOY:
Thank you so much. It's great to be here.

ANDREW:
And thanks for taking time to do this. I know you'd rather be out kayaking, especially on a weekend like this where the weather is starting to warm up.

PAUL:
Actually, we were kayaking all day yesterday. We had a train-the-trainer event ahead of SSTIKS. And I'm just as happy not to be kayaking because I'm sore.

Probably because of the darn ropes, which is not where I excel.

ANDREW:
Yeah.

PAUL:
And I'm just as happy to be talking to you.

NOY:
I also discovered I do not excel at ropes, but I have a little bit of a bug now. I really want to set some up so that I can actually become better.

ANDREW:
Yeah. You know, I never really got into ropes. I didn't understand the connection with kayaking.

It actually takes a lot more athleticism than it does to do all the Greenland kayak rolls.

PAUL:
It certainly does.

ANDREW:
And of course, it helps your rolling technique as well. Isn't that true?

PAUL:
That was how it developed. As I'm sure you've heard from Dubside and from just studying it, that it was developed by the Inuit as a way to essentially stay in shape and keep their mind-muscle memory going during the times when they weren't kayaking. And it was a training for kids as well in order to habituate them to those kind of maneuvers.

The hard part is you don't have the buoyancy of the water helping you, as you admit. That buoyancy is wonderful. It's our friend.

If it's just you and gravity, it can be a huge challenge. And I have nothing but admiration for people who can do the ropes rolls well. It's also something, by the way, that kids tend to excel at.

And it's very cool to see them working through the ropes routines.

ANDREW:
My daughter had tried it once when Dubside had his ropes set up during a symposium in the Puget Sound. Yeah, kids really love it. I was wondering, maybe that's how it developed, where they had these harpoon lines strung up and kids started playing around with it.

PAUL:
Yep. Could very well be.

NOY:
That's an interesting question. I had asked Dubside about the ropes, and he said, well, you know how you really get better at them? You really have to set them up so that they're really readily accessible.

So I was thinking, okay, my house, the basement, outside, somewhere.

ANDREW:
So you're planning to set some up in your house?

NOY:
I'm looking over. As soon as I get back to my house, I think I'm going to look over and see what my options are.

ANDREW:
Yeah, you just have to stick a bolt into a heavy stud and a carabiner and put some ropes there.

PAUL:
Just between two trees.

NOY:
And have something soft below you.

ANDREW:
All right. Let's talk about SSTIKS. This is a historic event because we haven't had a SSTIKS since 2019.

PAUL:
Yeah, like many things, there was an interruption because of COVID, and we were right in the midst of planning things, and we just couldn't go forward with it, unfortunately. And then the next year, too, we just weren't able to get SSTIKS off the ground. We lost a lot of the impetus that we have and the SSTIKS machine.

So this year, we really made a huge effort to get SSTIKS going again. It will be. It's June 6th through 9th.

It's going to be in Skamokawa Vista Park in Washington on the Columbia River this year, which is not exactly where it was in the past in Twanoh Park. A few nitpickers have called out it's technically not the South Sound.

ANDREW:
Yeah.

PAUL:
Because that's what South Sound, Traditional Inuit Kayaking Symposium, is what makes up the SSTIKS name. Close enough, and it doesn't really matter. But it's a lovely place, and they were really interested to have SSTIKS there as an event on their calendar in that region.

And so it was wonderful to have that partnership. And we really, really appreciate that. We're working with Columbia River Kayaking and the folks at Skamokawa River Resort.

And they've been tremendous partners. So SSTIKS is happening, and we hope folks on this call will be able to attend and enjoy SSTIKS. I've been going to SSTIKS—I wasn't at all one of the founders, whether the Tim Mattson, Don Beal, Henry generation—but I've been going for the last decade or so. And I fell in love with SSTIKS immediately.

What I liked about SSTIKS—and I want to set the stage here— is that I am not a super kayaking hotshot by any means. I love kayaking. It's a super important part of my life, and I love using the Greenland tool set.

And I have a reverence for the traditional roots of kayaking within the Arctic peoples, and then especially with the Inuit peoples of Greenland. It's really something I love to do, more than something I'm really, really, really good at. That kind of love is what attracted me to SSTIKS, because it felt to me like I was joining a big family.

And SSTIKS has that family feel. It's quite literally, in the past, a family event, because it's one of the only kayak events that had a really active kids track. But it has a familial feeling as well, with everybody there supporting each other.

There is competition there, but it's a friendly competition. And there's a place for every kayaker there of all different abilities.

ANDREW: 
Now, how about you, Noy? How did you get involved in Greenland style and being a coordinator for SSTIKS?

NOY:
Well, I got involved in kayaking a long time ago. I did some river kayaking. And then more recently, about four or five years ago, I started doing some ocean kayaking.

It might only be about four years now. And I bought a boat that was way too big for me. And I had a Euro paddle that was way too long for me.

And a friend lent me an extra paddle that they had hanging around their garage. And it turned out to be, you know, it was a Greenland paddle. And it was very, very skinny, even for the skinny sticks that we like.

But I just kind of started using it and fell in love with it. It was my go-to for the first year. And when I was out in some wind and waves, it was an extremely secure paddle.

There's something about that stick when it goes in the water. You're just, you know, you're fine.

ANDREW:
Yeah.

NOY:
So I have been experimenting with other kinds of Greenland paddles. And I did end up doing some other Euro paddling. I got an L3 coastal kayaking instructor certification recently and used a Euro paddle for that.

But went back to my beloved stick after that was done. Although, I don't think that the ACA actually requires the use of any particular kind of paddle. So that's just an aside.

In terms of SSTIKS, my love of the Greenland paddle is what drew me to volunteer to help out with SSTIKS. And they took me up on my offer. 

PAUL:
Luckily.! Because Noy is bringing wonderful new energy to sticks. And she's going to be championing SSTIKS going forward as we go forward in the next couple decades.

ANDREW:
Oh, yeah.

NOY:
Yeah. I mean, this northwest region has such a rich wealth of areas in which to enjoy our sport. There are so many different paddling clubs to draw on.

And many people spread out across all those different clubs who are very interested in Greenland paddling. So I think SSTIKS is really such a wonderful event to kind of reinvigorate when we're bringing it back post-COVID this time. And I'm so excited about it.

And we have after our train-the-trainer yesterday, I think we've got a number of people who are very excited about it. So we're really super looking forward to it. Neither of us is Dubside.

And so we have invited, as you know, Dubside.

ANDREW:
Oh, yeah. I forgot to mention!

PAUL:
Why try to pretend to be Dubside when you can get Dubside? Yeah.

ANDREW:
So Dubside will be there. He'll be giving the keynote address. Isn't that correct?

PAUL:
Yeah, Dubside will be a keynote speaker. And we're having another great speaker, too. Another very important person is Brian Schultz.

ANDREW:
Oh, yeah.

PAUL:
Brian's going to be there. And just to pick up a little bit on what Noy was saying, we are so fortunate here in the northwest. When I started kayaking, my first kayak was the kayak I built with Brian.

And my first paddle was the paddle I carved with Brian. So I started right away with a Greenland paddle. I've really never used a so-called Euro paddle.

I mean, I have one, of course, and I've used it. But my paddle since I started has been a Greenland paddle, and my boat was an F1. I didn't build one of the East Greenland or West Greenland kayaks.

But learning that kind of technique and building it myself meant a lot to me. Just sitting in it and feeling it, you know, the way it moved in the water and it flexed. You could still smell the red cedar smell coming up sometimes.

And it really cemented for me what it meant to kayak. And we're lucky to have people like Brian here and to have that kind of tradition here. It's rare in other places.

It does not exist in other places. 

ANDREW: 
Absolutely.

PAUL:
And Harvey. I met Harvey very early on. Harvey Golden, who I'm sure many people on your calls know is the preeminent kayak historian of our times. Especially with its traditional boats. To have him here and to meet him. I was fortunate enough to live just a few blocks from him in Portland.

All of that meant a lot to me and helped guide my career as a kayaker.

ANDREW:
Wow. Yeah. That probably has a lot to do with moving location down to the Columbia River.

A lot of these people live in Portland. Brian, Harvey…

PAUL:
Yeah. Originally, and we mentioned, I think, SSTIKS was in Twanoh Park up in the Hood Canal area. Really, the move to the Columbia River this year has much to do with logistics, if anything.

We sort of lost our continuing reservation at that park. So where the permanent home of SSTIKS will be, we're not certain yet. That's to be decided.

Like I was going to say, a lot of things about SSTIKS. I want to make this one of the themes as we're talking. SSTIKS is a living thing.

Noy and I are working on it this year, but we're really, really looking for other people to get involved and to people who are interested in traditional kayaking as much as we are. Become involved with SSTIKS. You're more than welcome.

We're looking for new leadership and new ideas to come into the symposium.

NOY:
Absolutely. I think in the tradition in Greenland, it's a very community event. We have a broad community and we're really, really, really open to all who want to come and help participate to make it whatever it is moving forward.

PAUL:
Yep. We don't think of it as something cast in concrete that has to be maintained exactly the way it is. If SSTIKS changes completely over the next few years in good ways, we'll be the happiest people around because everything needs new ideas and new ways of doing things.

NOY:
The heart of it is that it's a celebration of this style of kayaking. It's sharing all this information and getting people like Dubside In to come help share his experiences and expertise and the camaraderie that we all get from being able to play with our kayaks and our Greenland paddles.

PAUL:
And our friends out there.

NOY:
I think at its heart, it's all about that and the specifics of it can develop and change over time. We're looking forward to how new people who get involved can help grow it.

ANDREW:
Now, one of the things that has made SSTIKS unique among the traditional paddling events sponsored by Kayak USA is the kids program that you had mentioned. Is that still a feature of the new SSTIKS?

NOY:
Well... It is. Yes or no?

PAUL:
This year, we've had very few families with kids sign up. And that's not part of a plan. We want it to remain a kid-friendly, family-oriented event.

We used to have a lot of people that would come year after year and bring their kids. I used to bring my kids when they were young. This year, with a smaller event, we just didn't get that many kids.

But definitely, we want that to remain part of SSTIKS. It's one thing that made SSTIKS so distinctive is that we had the kids program.

ANDREW:
I'm curious because you two are probably involved in paddling clubs and going around to paddling clubs and talking about Greenland style kayaking. I'm just curious, have you seen the demographic shift to a more older population as the years have gone on? Do you think there are fewer people with younger families kayaking?

PAUL:
Sea kayaking always has skewed a bit on the older side, as we're probably all aware. A lot of younger people start out, I think, if they're starting out in kayaking at all, in Whitewater. They want the thrill.

You can get a lot of thrills in sea kayaking, as we all know. But it definitely skews a bit older. I don't think that we're not seeing kids this year because the population has aged out.

I think it was just the dynamics of restarting the event, trying to keep it small, losing some of the momentum with families. I'm pretty confident that next year we'll be back with a very healthy kids program.

ANDREW:
When you talk to clubs about traditional kayaking, do you find that a lot of people already know a lot about traditional kayaking?

PAUL:
There's a hunger for it. Noy and I talked down at BASK, which is a very large club down in the Bay Area. I recently moved down there.

There was a hunger for it. We did a talk, and Noy and Trina taught a Greenland class. It filled up in five minutes.

There's a lot of people who use paddles, but they don't really know how to use them (Greenland paddles). Or they own them and never use them. Boy, that filled up quickly.

They were so excited. They were so excited to have that class. It was unbelievable.

Dubside would be overwhelmed with people. I'd love to talk to them about having a Dubside event down there. There would be standing room.

NOY:
Oh, actually, that would be a great idea.

PAUL:]
People would love it.

ANDREW:
We've got to talk to them about it.

PAUL:
Oh, no, absolutely. We've talked about it. You could have a SSTIKS-like event down in the Bay Area, and it would be very popular.

There was one once upon a time called TAKS.

ANDREW:
Yes.

PAUL:
It was a bit farther north, up in the Mendocino area. But you could easily do one in the Bay Area, and you could help spread the love down there. It would be very popular.

ANDREW:
I did attend a TAKS event that was held up in Trinidad.

PAUL:
Trinidad, yes. You don't have to “Slap a Wall” and all that. That's an awesome area to kayak.

ANDREW:
Oh, it was fantastic, yes. Real coastal kayaking with the boulder field and the surf. It's still also a protected bay.

PAUL:
You can dial up and dial down as you like. It's a wonderful area.

ANDREW:
Helen Wilson's playground. Well, in the Pacific Northwest, where can you go for Greenland-style instruction?

I mean, SSTIKS was the event to do it.

NOY:
There's been a resurgence up in this area, and quite a few people within the local paddling groups are using Greenland paddles. You have interviewed James Manke on the Dubcast? Yeah, so he's up across the water, or he was.

I think he's relocated, but he does go back, I think, to Ucluelet. He's helped to train a number of people. So there are some people who are in this area who use Greenland paddles, but there's just nothing like the SSTIKS event.

And so many of us have been looking to see when it was going to be coming back again. So I think that's why it did fill up, and we are really so happy that it's going to be starting to happen again up here.

PAUL:
One thing, speaking of passing the knowledge on, the tradition at SSTIKS for years was to bring folks actually from Greenland. This year, of course, we're not doing that with smaller-scale SSTIKS this year. But that's something we hope to keep as an ongoing tradition at SSTIKS, is to bring people from the source to be mentors at the event.

ANDREW:
So let's talk about the event itself. What do you have planned on the schedule?

NOY:
Well, we have a lot planned.

PAUL:
We have a lot planned for such a small event. So it's June 6th through 9th, as we said, at Skamolkawa Vista Park. Each day there's a morning and afternoon session.

And the morning and afternoon sessions always include a lot of rolling, strokes, and tripping, as well as ropes. You don't have to be an expert roller to come to SSTIKS at all. It's a lot of people come to learn to roll.

A lot of people, you know, that's the skill they want to acquire or they kind of got to roll and and of course once you get a roll, you know, it really opens things up. You can get out onto rougher water and in a much safer fashion, obviously for yourself and for your friends. We recognize that and we have a lot of opportunities for rolling at SSTIKS.

We also talk about rescuing and how to properly and safely use a traditional kayak, kayak that doesn't have bulkheads. So how to dewater the kayak, how to get somebody back in and out of a kayak if they need to, how to rescue people who have flipped over and may not be able to right themselves. It's one of the few places, I think, where you can actually take those kind of classes.

That was part of our train-the-trainer yesterday, by the way. We had Don Beal, who's a master at that and he's a wonderful instructor in those arts.

NOY:
We're also having, I mean, honestly, as I understand it, most people go to SSTIKS for rolling. How can you not when Dubside is going to be there demoing all of the different rolls and having people there who can help you with any of them that you would like to learn how to do. But one can't try to roll all day long and so there are some other things, kayak-related things, that we are offering and they are like half-day trips in the local area and there are some wonderful refuges nearby.

We will be doing strokes, beginning and advanced strokes.

PAUL:
We have games as well. So traditionally in Greenland, games are an important part of learning and maintaining your kayaking ability and we follow that tradition. Some of the SSTIKS events in the past, we've had many Greenland games.

Again, this year we're keeping things low-key and a bit smaller scale, but we'll definitely have races. We have Dead Fish Polo. One tradition at SSTIKS, which we'll always maintain, is the Wedding of Palo Race.

ANDREW:
Wait a minute. Explain the Dead Fish Polo.

PAUL:
Oh, I just tossed it out there. I just tossed it out there.

ANDREW:
I mean, I know what you're talking about, but it sounds kind of funny.

PAUL:
Dead Fish Polo is a kind of a melee kayaking where you have a, not a literal, but a constructed dead fish. It could be actually something shaped like a fish, like a sock stuffed with flotation. Or this year, actually, Trina Hahn created a ring, which worked really nicely.

And essentially, it's sort of a keep-away passing game, using only your paddles to move the dead fish around. You can do teams, or you can just do every person for themselves. It's a lot of fun.

And it's also a great way to cement the skills you're learning, because in order to do it well, you have to be able to, you know, scull. You have to be able to maneuver your kayak backwards and forwards to the side. When people get really enthusiastic, people tip over.

So you've got to be able to roll up. And so it's a way of cementing all the skills that you're learning in a really fun environment. We also do the Wedding of Palo Race, which also needs some explanation.

There was an early movie filmed in Greenland by Knud Rasmussen and others. It was a fictional story about an Inuit love triangle. It's a wonderful movie to see.

It captures glimpses of, obviously, fictionalized, but nonetheless, take it with postmodern eyes, it's still wonderful. And it showcased a lot of the traditional skills, kayaking skills. And we take a subset of those skills and built it into a tradition called the Wedding of Palo Race, taken from the main character in the movie.

And it's a relay race where you move across a short distance in kayaks, and it involves a sprint. It involves a seal tow, which often, when we had a lot of kids, the kids would be the seals and you'd have to drag them along behind your kayak. This year, it's going to be adults, so that'll be tragic.

And then even more challenging.

ANDREW:
They're in the water when you're dragging them?

PAUL: 
In the water, in the water, hanging off your toggle. And then there's the bride section where you have to have the bride in the movie, sits on the back of the kayak as Palo heroically paddles her through a storm. And so we did the bride section, sans storm, but the bride is, you get a kayak or you get somebody sitting behind you in the kayak facing backwards, you paddling forwards.

My favorite year was when Tim Mattson was the bride on one of the kayaks.

NOY:
Maybe he will be again.

PAUL:
Maybe he will be again. If you know Tim, Tim's a big guy. And his girlfriend, Pat, was the paddler.

And that was, I've got a great picture of that with that kayak. We have a lot of fun at SSTIKS too. It's a fun event.

Another feature we did in the past was a film festival. I'm not certain if we'll do that this year again, it's a truncated one, but people could either bring short films or a little couple of minute film with their GoPro or whatever at the event or their iPhone. And at the last night, we'd have a film screening.

If you go onto the SSTIKS website, kayaks, spelled with a Q-A-J-A-Q-P-N-W dot O-R-G, you can see the films from our past film festivals and they're fun to see.

ANDREW:
Awesome. I love film festivals.

PAUL:
Film festivals rock.

ANDREW:
I'll definitely check it out. Yeah.

PAUL:
Yeah, yeah. There's some good ones. And also, again, if you're in the region, in the Pacific Northwest, and you want to be involved, hop on board.

We're looking for new ideas and new energy and new people. I think I said that once. I'll say it again.

Yeah.

ANDREW:
Another thing that I really like about the event is just simply looking at all the skin on frame and the homemade wooden kayaks that people bring.

PAUL:
Yep.

ANDREW:
Half of them probably belong to Harvey Golden, but just an incredible variety, incredible craftsmanship in these kayaks. Very inspiring. It has been very inspiring for me when I went to build my own kayaks.

And another thing I think is unique about SSTIKS, and this is probably because of Harvey's influence, is the presence of Alaskan kayaks and the Aleut kayak. That may be because we're in the Pacific Northwest and there has been interest in the Alaskan tradition here. Well, George Dyson, of course, lives up in Bellingham, and Corey Friedman runs a Skinboat school in Anacortes, and all he builds is baidarkas.

PAUL:
Yeah. You see a lot of his boats or his designs at SSTIKS, for sure. And all those guys, again, why we're so lucky up in this region. You can't overstate how important Harvey's been. He's an amazing person. But the Skinboat School and the Wooden Boats Shop and all those folks up there.

ANDREW:
Yeah. The Center for Wooden Boats.

NOT:
Super important. And we're lucky. And Brian.

ANDREW
Yeah.

PAUL:
And Kilii. And others.

ANDREW:
Oh, that's right. Kilii.

PAUL:
It kind of goes on and on, you know?

ANDREW:
Yeah. Yeah. I first met Keely at SSTIKS, and he's gone on to become a National Geographic photographer.

PAUL:
Yeah, absolutely. Everybody. And you know what?

You too. The Death Point Pirate, when I was starting to kayak and everything, I was looking at your videos.

ANDREW:
Oh, yeah? Okay.

PAUL:
They're wonderful. And it helped build, you know, it's part of the culture here. It's a very rich culture with roots in that tradition here.

And it's nice.

ANDREW:
Okay, great. What else would you like to mention?

PAUL:
Did we mention that we're looking for people to hop on board?

ANDREW:
Okay, as an aside, you know, I actually volunteered one year. I taught a paddling class, and I led a half-day trip. You know, you went from Twanoh State Park up to Alder Brook Resort.

It's a beautiful resort. Grand Hotel. Marina. We all stopped and went to the bar and had a drink.

And on the way back, the trip kind of took a little bit longer than I expected.

PAUL:
That's an awesome trip.

ANDREW:
Yeah. And we ran into some commercial oyster harvesters along the way and bought a bag of oysters for five bucks and grilled them over the fire when we got back. It was an awesome time.

But being too involved in a lot of these organizations just doesn't fit into my lifestyle.

PAUL:
Yep.

NOY:
So I greatly appreciate people like you, Paul and Noy, that are willing to put in their time and effort to do something like this.

PAUL:
Well, it's rewarding. You know, like I said, I've been involved with SSTIKS the last decade, helping organize a bit. So it's nice to see that SSTIKS needs a bit more help this year to step forward and keep it going.

It's a pleasure. And to find people like Noy who want to come in with all of her energy is great.

ANDREW:
How have you been going about rebuilding the team, the team of volunteers to have this event?

NOY:
We've been really talking to people. Paul and Joanne have been really good about giving some presentations. And after we hold this event, I think it will start to sell itself again.

But because there are plenty of people who really want to better understand how to use, they want to know more about the culture and history and they want to better understand practically how to use the tool a little bit more effectively. And I think that you have this opportunity for an assemblage of many different people who are very interested in and committed to the Greenland paddle and understanding the history. And you get them, you get them all together there.

And it will end up being with the lineup of people who we have. We have people with a lot of experience and people with not that much experience and people who really use the tools very, very effectively and not all the same. Not everyone has the same approach to the forward stroke.

And so I think that it will be really, really worthwhile for people who attend to get that diversity and the opportunity to kind of come into contact with the mix of people that we will be having there. I'm so excited myself and wish in some ways that I was just going to attend and not to help run it. So there you go.

ANDREW:
Right. Well, excellent. Tell me about the camping situation because don't people, it goes over the weekend. So people stay overnight.

PAUL:
It's one of the nice things about that park is there's quite a few campsites. There's 10 sites, there's RV sites with electricity hookups, and there are lodging as well. There's the Duck Inn, there's the Skamokawa Inn, Vista Inn, which may be sold out at this point.

But it's great lodging there and you can dial it up, dial it down.

ANDREW:
Yeah, great.

NOY:
We're super excited about it. It's not in the South Sound, but it has some other opportunities for us to explore. It's another area with different refuges around.

And I think that there can be, it'll be, it'll be really...

PAUL:
It's going to be, it's interesting this year too. There's going to be a little bit more dynamism there. There's wind there that you don't get on Hood Canal and there's current.

So that'll present new opportunities as well. So that'll be interesting to see how that impacts the event.

ANDREW:
So it's freshwater.

PAUL:
It's freshwater. Yeah, absolutely freshwater, but it's tidal.

ANDREW:
Okay.

PAUL:
We're not that far from the Pacific there. This is definitely tidal. There's quite a bit of tide range actually.

ANDREW:
Okay. Well, for me, this will be, it'll be 20 years since I first attended SSTIK in 2005.

I'm super excited about it. It was a life-changing event for me, introducing me into Greenland style and getting to meet all these people in the community. And over the years, I've met so many just really interesting people who are involved in traditional kayaking and extremely creative people too. Whether they're involved in building kayaks or carving paddles or like Kilii photography. Traditional kayaking just seems to attract a lot of creative people.

PAUL:
I think that's true. I know that's true. Creative types are overrepresented in Greenland kayaking for sure.

And I'm not a master builder, but there are some people who have just exquisite building skills. And part of the fun of the event, as you mentioned, is going there and seeing the boats that people have built, either skin boats or often stitch and glue boats. And they're beautiful works of art.

NOY:
Absolutely. 

ANDREW: 
Okay. Well, why don't we wrap it up there? One more time. Can you tell people how to find information about SSTIKS online?

PAUL:
The best way is to go to our websit, Qajaq (spelled with Q and a J) PNW. QAJAQPNW.ORG. If you do a Google search for SSTIKS with two “s”s,  it'll bring you there as well.

But our website's probably the best way. We're on Facebook. We're soon to be hopefully more aggressively on Instagram and other venues.

But the best way is the website. And that'll tell you a lot, all you need to know about the event. And it's June 6th through 9th at Skamokawa Vista Park in Skamokawa, Washington.

ANDREW:
Awesome. Paul and Noy, thanks so much.

PAUL:
Thank you.

ANDREW
Great talking to you.

PAUL:
Yeah, it's going to be cool to see you there. So looking forward to it.

ANDREW:
Yeah, looking forward to seeing you!

NOY:
Absolutely. See you!