Adventures in Water(and Snow) Sports 2: Gunnel Jumping

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When I was in high school I joined an explorer scout troop, I had been a cub scout but not a boy scout, that some friends were in mainly because they were going on a canoe trip. Our troop was sponsored by a Nike Missile base that was just outside of town; a search shows that there are remnants of these long closed cold war bases located at about 250 cities around the U. S. The canoe trip was to last about a week and was to leave from a very large scout ranch that was located on a river in my home state of Texas. The first day there the councilors, who were not a lot older than us, taught us how to canoe. Then they showed off there skills at gunnel jumping which is where they would stand on the solid cross piece at the back of the canoe and move up and down by flexing their knees and propel the canoe through the water. There are some videos on Youtube that are titled gunnel jumping but in them the guy is standing more forward on the top of the sides(or gunnels) of a canoe that does not have the cross piece at back like the aluminum canoes we had did. Anyway the councilors showed this to us and them said we were not to try it. Right, tell a bunch of teenage boys they can't do something. So on the second day after we left the camp we stopped early were there was a large bend in the river with a very slow current. So after pitching camp with the pup tents provide by our sponsor, we were all trying to gunnel jump. Everyone was having a lot of trouble doing it until I got my turn and, unlike my water skiing problems, I was able to this the first time I tried with no trouble at all. In fact I was pretty much the only one who was able to do. I never fell while doing but finally stopped so someone else could try.