nicole11@unm.edu
Freezing white-water rapids will flood the desert this weekend when a film festival centered on extreme water sports comes to town.
An international festival visits Albuquerque for the first time Saturday and packs 34 paddling-oriented films into three and a half hours. The festival features all types of paddle sports, from traditional canoeing and kayaking to stand-up paddleboarding, in which the paddler stands on a surfboard and paddles down a coastline, and bugging, in which paddlers sit in a seat-like floatable and navigate white-water rapids with webbed gloves on their hands.
Stephen Verchinski, New Mexico host of the Reel Paddling Film Festival, said the lack of water in New Mexico is not a deterrent for Albuquerque’s paddling community. He said more people join the sport every year, and that there was a 6 percent increase in paddle sports nationwide in 2011.
“We live in a desert. Where do you kayak, and who do you kayak with?” he said. “There are all of these lakes, a lot of them are hidden, and they’re good from just a standpoint of people doing recreational kayaking to full-blown ‘I am taking out all my gear, and I’m going out on this lake for four or five days.’”
Verchinski said everyone is invited to the festival, whether they have experience with paddle sports or not, but he thinks the paddle community will be especially enthusiastic.
“Folks who like the water and water only, this is their thing,” he said. “I’m holding it in the middle of the day, so it’s going to be really hot, and you’re going to want to see water.”
The films range from politically charged documentaries to whimsical stop-motion features to documentation of awe-inspiring feats.
One of the films features a group of stand-up paddleboarders who travel 400 miles along the coast of British Columbia protesting a proposed BP oil pipeline. In another film, a man sits in a mossy canoe that looks like a log and plays the banjo, while a Muppet sings along from the shore. A stop-motion film shows a woman flying on a canoe paddle before she paddles a canoe through the forest.
“It’s pretty much anything you can think of,” Verchinski said. “I don’t know where some of these guys get their filming
capabilities, but they’re pretty awesome.”
Jim Wood, a stand-up paddleboard instructor and founder of Blue Dog Paddle Adventures, said watching paddle sports on film is just as beneficial as trying them out.
“I think the festival is important because it allows people who don’t know anything about paddling an opportunity to see something that they didn’t know existed,” Wood said. “Before someone actually sees it or does it, they have no idea of what it’s like.”
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The day after the film festival, local paddlers gather to lecture and teach basic safety precautions free of charge at the Alameda Open Space.
“If I can teach 30 to 50 new people into the sport and tell them what the state requires and the basics of learning, I’m helping out both the community and reducing the risk of fatality out there,” he said.
Verchinski said modern technology is making the sport safer than ever. For example, he said QR codes were printed on signs along a kayak route in Florida, so kayakers could instantly access route maps and conditions. Life-jacket technology is also advancing, and Verchinski said some life jackets are just small strips of inflatable cloth. Fashion-forward paddlers can even custom order them to match their leopard-print bikinis.
Verchinski said the potential danger of a sport should not deter participants.
“Some folks never get out of bed because they’re afraid of the world,” he said. “You can’t be afraid of the world all the time, you’ve got to manage the risk.”
Reel Paddling Film Festival
Saturday, noon to 3:30 p.m.
The Guild Cinema
$15, tickets must be purchased in advance at REI or online at ticketriver.com
Paddling Lecture Series
Sunday, 8 a.m. to 12 p.m.
Environmental Education Building at the Bachechi Open Space
Alameda Boulevard and Rio Grande Boulevard
Free
