ANOTHER CANOE is extremely dangerous for 3 reasons. First, you may feel the temptation to paddle past it; second, you may hit it by accident; and, third, you may experience senselessly noble feelings, try to help them and get swamped yourself. And, of course there are the numerous cases when people have tried to give something to the people in the other canoe, stretch out their hands (all 2, or 3 canoers at the same time) and the thing given (usually a camera) is the first to disappear into water. The canoers follow right after.

Probably it's quite nice you can't hear the others laugh while you are under the water-level.

Although you SEE quite well, as said the eldery lady who was taken to a canoe trip as a birthday present by her son (an experienced canoer). The lady grabbed a branch while her son was helping another canoe (with a baby in it); the 'senselessly noble' variant. As the son could not expect his mother ignore his strict order not to grab anything (except her paddle), he was totally unprepared for the situation. So, the mother grabbed a branch, the current was quite fast and the canoe was taken sideways and got swamped with the lady UNDER it. Quite a nasty situation, as the lady had never learned to swim, and everyone was relly worried - including our riverbank safety team - except the lady herself who cheerfully assured us the life jacket is a wonderful invention and that as soon as the canoe was lifted up a bit, it had become much lighter under the water and she had seen her son and felt quite confident, really.

So - it is absolutely wise to avoid other canoes. Of course, it MAY happen that you are there to watch THEM turning upside down, but even then you may be just a bit too close and get wet, too (as they splash, mostly).

One of the 3 dogs that have fallen into did so also 'thanks to' his over-helpful masters. He was visibly offended even after his nice fur was soft and nice again. The other one was a baby /doberman/, whose nap on his master's knees was cut short in a really wet and nasty way (but, to be fair, it's not at all easy to paddle with such a lapful of a dog, is it?) The third dog, a fox-terrier, fell from a sandstone wall. A North-Estonian dog, how should he have known such 'cliffs' exist, as North Estonia is really flat?