K ayaking equipment selection should be on the basis of warmth as well as strength.
Weather plays a big part in our whitewater kayaking and canoeing in New Zealand.
The weather is difficult to predict, as a minor variation in a low pressure system's track means it will either hit or miss us. Often, until it actually arrives, its a guessing game as to what tomorrow will bring, when a storm from the south has us in its sights. O verseas visitors can take our conditions lightly, and many have paid with their lives for it. The highest peak in the Southern Alps is only 12,000 feet, but the ferocity of the storms that can lash them is hard to comprehend unless viewed first hand. Many of our rivers are snow-fed.