Whether diving into a waterfall in a kayak, crossing the Atlantic on a stand-up board or risking it all as a fashion designer turning to building rafts, the characters in the 2022 World Tour Paddling Film Festival clearly are a different breed.
Local paddling club Northeast Wisconsin Paddlers will present five films from the series starting at 7 p.m. March 26 at the Cinema Theater in the Warch Campus Center at Lawrence University. Tickets are $10 in advance at newp.club or $15 at the door.
NEWP is a 501(c)3 nonprofit with the goal of encouraging and advancing paddle sport education and safety by offering kayak classes and group paddles open to the public.
The films range from five minutes to just under an hour and were all winners in the 2022 World Tour Paddling Film Festival. Here is the lineup.
- “Quality of Imagination” features a whitewater paddler who chooses his destinations based on where he can get the most air as he flips his boat over and over in rapids.
- “Last Known Coordinates” follows a stand-up paddler who attempts to go from Africa to the Caribbean while encountering major storms in his tricked-out board.
- “Voice Above Water” describes the devastation plastics are causing in the world’s oceans through the eyes of 90-year-old Indonesian fisherman.
- “Sheri” tells the inspirational story of a woman who was at the top as a designer of downhill ski clothing when illness robbed her of all of it, until a request from her son sends her back into prominence designing and sewing whitewater rafts.
- “Jotuun” follows three adrenalin-junkie friends taking on the waves and waterfalls of Iceland’s Jotuun River.