I'm looking to hear from anyone with experience in travelling with SUP paddles on domestic airlines.
If I bought a standard bag, would that suffice?
Or do you need stronger protection?
Also, do the local airlines tend to charge for oversized baggage (I'd just be taking a couple of paddles, but no boards)
haven't traveled with SUP paddles (yet) but have traveled with kayak paddles dozens of times and have learnt to always carry a min of 2 paddles, 1 just seems to easy to break (and have done so), have never had a transport breakage with 2 paddles packed together.
put a cardboard tube over the shaft or ya paddle in the bag and wrap the blade in the bag, bobs ya uncle
Travelled heaps I always put 2 in one Ron House paddle bag and that's it , never had any problems.
if you don't have a paddle bag... pad up the shaft and handle and use an old tennis racket cover for the blade...
I hear a lot of Airlines have newer planes (read Jetstar) and ALL the luggage on domestic flights must fit into the alloy "boxes" which may mean they cannot take regular 1 piece paddles. I would start thinking about 2 piece paddles if you intend to travel in the future.
Shameless plug for the KeNalu paddles, just heat them up with a hair dryer, take off the handle and the blade and then all you check is the shaft in a cardboard or pvc pipe tube. At the other end just heat them up again and put them back together, takes 5 minutes.
