“If you fall off you just get back on, maybe you’ll get wet, maybe you won’t – that’s half the fun of it…. The physical practice of yoga is a lot of core, a lot of balance, and a full body workout, so the two work very well together. A lot of yogis see it as taking they practice to the next level, but for a brand-new person it’s a whole different experience. You get a bit of paddling, a bit of yoga, and a whole lot of smiles. If it feels like 40 degrees outside you might want to fall in, it can be quite appealing!”
Casa London: What is it that you love about paddle boarding?
“There is so much you can do with it: rivers, surfing, you can just play on the lake, flat water, yoga, and basic fitness work. You aren’t even limited to flat calm sunny days – I went for a New Years Day paddleboard trip this year!”
However, despite the undeniable beauty of the area, there are a lot of water quality issues in Lake Erie – Drew spoke at a town hall meeting recently about the problems of water pollution from a more emotional/personal point of view than what would be expected from researchers, scientists, or campaigners.
“It’s a part of my life, I draw income from it, so that means that from both a personal and economic point of view it makes sense to have good water quality. I’m also collaborating with a group who started in Toronto called Waterkeeper. They provide swim maps internationally now, pulling privately or publicly collected data and displaying it on their app to try and raise awareness about water quality. They are also starting a new project called The Watermark Project that is collecting peoples individual stories about what their favourite body of water means to them, be it Lake Erie or the Thames running through London.
The goal with that is to get people thinking about clean water, remember the fun they had, and making these stories a part of a national database. A lot of regulations that are being put in place are based on information that says this body of water isn’t being used recreationally so now we are building a database of how these bodies of waters are being used in Canada, so they can be taken to the government to say, you can’t allow direct dumping here because people go swimming there in the summer.”
Ontario used to have much stricter water regulation, but it was slashed by the previous government, so these groups are pushing back to protect these beautiful bodies of water. This summer LondonSUP are running a handful of two hour classes (priced at a very reasonable $45 plus tax) to teach people to paddle board, teach them about the environmental work that is so close to Drew’s heart, and let them see the beauty that Ontario has that need protecting.
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