An inventor demonstrates paddle skis before the Stand Up Paddleboarding revolution.

There are many ways to take to the water in Devon and Cornwall with access to hosts of rivers, rias, creeks, estuaries, coves and beaches and a multitude of possibilities for entry into or onto any body of water but here the question is rather how are you going to take to the water? An innovator demonstrates his particular brand of watersport with a cross between water skiing and Stand Up Paddleboarding or SUP and launched perhaps just a few years before or indeed after its time.

Historically both paddle and surf boards originated from modes of travel in Polynesia and Hawaii. In 1926 a Hawaiian board restorer for Honolulu's Bishop Museum, Thomas Edward Blake built a replica board and hollowed it out. Blake went on to win the 1928 Pacific Coast Surfriding Championship and set records not broken until the 1950s. At around the same time water skis were being developed after in 1922 Ralph Samuelson of Minnesota used a pair of boards, a clothesline and his brother in a boat to invent the new sport. Ralph went on to tour and teach water skiing in America. In recent years paddleboarding has become the fastest growing watersport. What next? A revival of the paddle ski? Learn to do the splits first!