An Overview of a Shiva

So let's get this off to a good start.  Some weeks ago I finally got in my new boat... a shiny new green and black Pyranha Shiva.  The Shiva is Pyranha's new steep creeker and I had been looking forward to having one in my shed since last August.

In short:  Well worth the wait!

Thank you CKS!

The one word to describe the Shiva is BOOF.  All you have to do is look at a rock or edge and boat leaps into the air.  I've even bounced out of the water when hitting a rock sideways.  Super fun!

I'm not a big person.  ~ 140 dripping wet before all the gear and the Medium is just the right size.  Don't get me wrong, it's a big boat.  At 80 gallons and 8'6", there's a lot of plastic around you, but it doesn't paddle that way.  With the extreme progressive rocker, the massive stern stays nicely out of the water and actually gives the feel of a shorter boat when handling on the water.  In fact, when you look at how the hull sits on the floor, the boat actually rises off the carpet just behind the seat.  This allows the boat to have a nice rise when moving through the water at speed.  This is to say that you don't have to work hard to rocker some of the stern into the water and therefor the bow lifts up really easily, almost automatically.
Speaking of the hull, I wouldn't call it a true displacement or plaining hull, but closer to the latter.  With this design Pyranha has gotten away from the extreme edges of the Burn and Everest.  The Shiva has tight "roundy" edges that do transition into a zone of flatness right in the middle of the boat.  What is lost in control while in big pushy water is more than made up for by stability and predictability when a rock comes into play.  She still catches those micro-eddys with style, you just have to remember that you're in a creek boat and not a play boat.

The most important design element of the Shiva, in my opinion, is the where the beam, or widest point, is located.  Usually you'll find the widest point of a creek boat to be right in the center.  With the Shiva (as well as Dagger Nomad, and the old WaveHopper type racers) the beam is positioned back, just at the back of the cockpit.  This gives the boat a lovely tapering going toward the bow.  This makes for a very fast design (it looks like a torpedo in front of you) and greatly increases secondary stability.  For example, when landing a boof with the boat heeled dramatically to one side (which would usually be cause for a big dynamic brace), the Shiva, given even the smallest bit of forward momentum, feel like it's almost self-righting.

As far as comfort, I could sit in this boat all day.  The most salient point would be about the knees.  It feels to me like the Shiva, while nice and tall, is a tad bit more narrow in the knees than most.  Now this comes down to a lot of personal preference, but for me, having my knees splayed wider translates to more strain on my Sciatic nerve over the long run.

A word about the stern, it's positively massive.  It would take an equally massive seam to pull it down.  It's also easy to access and could easily hold gear for an overnight.

Off the water, this boat is a beast.  My biggest complaint would be weight, but it's just a lot of plastic.  With pin kit, wet gear, and everything else, I was really struggling on the hike out of the Upper Taos Box.  That also might have been because I did more driving than anything else this winter.....
As I eluded to, this is much more of a steep creeker than a big water boat.  It's tall with relatively soft edges and therefor can get pushed around easily if you're not really on top of your paddling.  I was more comfortable in Escalante Creek than in the Cross Mountain of the Yampa.

Can't wait to get her on the Embudo next weekend!

Thanks for reading!