Kayaking is much more than a sport for Dustin Newman. To the 27-year-old boat builder, paddling serves as a means to renew a healthy relationship to the waters that have sustained his people for millennia. Unangax̂ from King Cove, Newman now lives in Southcentral, where he spends summers guiding for Kayak Adventures Worldwide.
Ten years ago, long before he became a guide, Newman began working with mentor Mark Daniels to learn the art of building iqyâx (traditional Unangax̂ kayaks) and nigilax̂ (open-skin community canoes). Daniels has worked in collaboration with Unagax̂ communities for the last thirty years and now runs boat-building workshops in Ferndale, California.
Traditional iqyâx are narrower than today’s recreational kayaks, making them more likely to tip over, but much more efficient to paddle over long distances. The long, slender boats were historically built with wooden frames and seal skin membranes. “They were primarily for hunting and fishing. It started off with hunting seals, sea lions, sea otters, whales — all from kayaks,” he explains. “Not little tiny porpoises, but humpbacks, fin whales, and minkes,” he adds.
“When we’re building a kayak, we take its purpose and goals into consideration,” says Newman. For example, boats that are intended for expeditions or overnight trips will be slightly wider and can hold more weight than kayaks that are intended to move quickly over long distances.
Over the last decade, Newman has completed five builds of his own and helped with roughly fifteen others under Daniels’ guidance. Now, he is a primary builder and will soon be working with his own apprentice on solo builds in his home region. Newman is driven by his motivation to help reclaim a practice that has been largely lost due to colonization. “We’re still connected to the water, but it’s not the relationship that it was 300 years ago,” he says. “Kayaking at that time was about survival. It’s what made us thrive in our area. And then once extractive colonization took place, we lost that connection to our kayaks,” he explains.
For this reason, Newman continues to confront staggering logistical challenges to bring iqyâx building and paddling instruction to communities in the Aleutians. “We have to rebuild that relationship with our waters, take care of our waters, and have ownership over our waters and area to sustain what our people have done for thousands of years,” he says.
In preparation for this goal, Newman has received numerous certifications from the American Canoe Association (ACA) through his job with Kayak Adventures Worldwide. To his knowledge, he is the first in his region to receive an instructor certification from the ACA. But paddling in the Aleutian chain poses greater risks than paddling in Southcentral — the Bering sea boasts strong currents, large waves, whirlpools, and other dangers that require a higher baseline skill level than ACA framework is designed for. “Paddlers were able to go out in really strong weather and strong winds,” he says of his Unangax̂ ancestors. “How do we get back to that point?” He muses.
Newman plans to develop a new framework designed specifically for his region. He says that despite the nail-biting conditions he’s experienced paddling in the Bering Sea, he knows that commitment to this practice is vital for the health and well-being of his people.
“When we do builds, we intentionally make time to have talking circles and create this circle of trust, to support one another. It gives our build so much more meaning, but it also gives the kayak so much more meaning” Newman says. “Good energy is put into the vessel, because in our own beliefs these vessels are alive. They have a spirit, and they have to be respected and regarded in that way.
