By: Foxsup - Ok - it's no secret that I am neither a Naish nor an adjustable paddle fan so this was always gunna be an interesting outing for me. Got my hands on a new Naish Makani adjustable 8inch paddle yesterday. To the best of my knowledge it has a full carbon shaft and fibreglass blade and I know its an 8 inch blade caus' it's written on the blade.

First impression is that it's a really nice looking paddle and its very very light - although the only adjustable paddles I have used have been the really heavy alloy paddles and IMO they were bloody awful but adequate I suppose for their intended purpose.

This morning I loaded the dog on my 9fter and headed up the creek and was immediately impressed at how light the paddle felt and how smoothly the blade moved through the water. It took a while to get used to the adjustable doovy because when I change sides I slide my hand on the shaft and I caught my hand on the adjuster a couple of times - but made a slight change in my technique when changing sides with the paddle, and no more dramas.

I had set the length of the paddle the same as my everyday surf paddle but I found that cruising with the strong current behind me the paddle felt short so I simply stopped paddling and lengthened it by two inches and it was perfect for the relaxed paddle up stream. Coming back into the current the paddle felt way too long to get a good powerful stroke so quite quickly and simply shortened it by about 3 inches and found the perfect length for a shorter more powerful stroke into the current. I made a couple of more changes over the hour and a half I was out and actually felt quite spoilt by being able to have the best length for the changing conditions throughout the paddle.

Overall I was so very impressed with the paddle and will be having one in my quiver for sure as my backup paddle and for lending to friends. Just gotta get some stickers to cover up the Naish logo so nobody knows I have entered the dark realm. :)