Health & Kayaking (The child obesity ‘epidemic’).
I remember long summer days spent on the beach, running around, making sand castles, jumping waves and playing around in the dinghy.
It’s becoming an increasing concern in New Zealand. It’s talked about on current affairs shows, paraded in front of us on reality tv programmes, discussed in our newspapers and has even made it to select committee level of government. What are we talking about? The child obesity ‘epidemic’.
Parent’s have many options these days when it comes to entertaining their children and while it may seem easy and convenient in our busy lifestyles to sit them in front of the tv or x-box, it’s proving to be detrimental to everyone.
So enough about the doom and gloom, what can we do to make sure our kids or entertained in a positive and fun way? Well one of the best ways is spending time with them “doing stuff”. It can be as easy as buying or hiring a kayak and spending time with your children using it at your nearest expanse of water. Kayaking is an excellent mechanism to achieve things like spending time with your kids, teaching them to be safe around water, how to use their body, left brain/right brain exercises, caring for the environment, reading the weather, independence and all the while they are exercising and becoming healthier kids. Kid’s thrive on being able to achieve in front of their parents/caregivers and this is a great way to learn along with them. Go down to your local sports shop and buy a simple hand line and a few hooks and sinkers, then jump on the kayak with your child and take them fishing around the bays. They’ll get to spend time with you and maybe even hook you a fish for dinner!
So what should a parent look for when deciding on a kayak? For starters kayaks can be boiled down to sit-in or sit-on kayaks. Sit-on-tops are the more practical and popular with families. The reasons are simple: Firstly, they have sealed hulls and are made of plastic, so are hard to sink or damage, making them very safe. Secondly, most sit-on-tops can carry more than 120kg. This means that the whole family can use it and just about the whole family can get on it at the same time. Thirdly, there is a wide range of kayaks to suit a whole family from sit-on-tops designed just for kids, right through to double sit-on-tops that can fit two adults and child, When looking at buying it is helpful to visualise what you see the family doing with the kayak. Ask yourself some questions like, How many people would be using the kayak at one time? Will anyone want to go fishing or diving with it? Is the whole family going to use that kayak or do you look at getting more than one kayak? Maybe getting a boat for the smaller kids alone and a larger craft for the people who still consider themselves kids is an idea. This will provide opportunities for young kids to gain some independence at the same time.
Visualise what you want for your family and then visit and talk to the crew at Fergs Kayaks ask some of these questions and then try the boats to get feel for what they can do for your family.