Greenland's traditional watercraft is thriving once again, thanks to a determined effort to save

NUUK – Most days, Usarak Heinrich, 44, paddles his kayak into the ice-free waters of Greenland‘s west coast with a rifle slung over his shoulder and hopes he gets a chance to shoot a seal, or perhaps a few thick-billed ­murres.

Greenland is in the midst of a kayaking renaissance. But even here, most people think Heinrich is a touch crazy to use his kayak, rather than a motor boat, to hunt.

That doesn't deter him.

"If my ancestors could do it in their time, why not me?" he asks, smiling, while examining one sleek craft under repair inside the small shop that belongs to Peqatigiiffik Qajaq Nuuk, the local kayaking club to which he belongs.

"Without this kayak, there would be no Greenlandic people."

Similar clubs exist in most of Greenland's communities. But it wasn't always so. Until the early 1980s, if you wanted to see a Greenlandic kayak, you usually needed to visit a museum.

Kayak building, once an essential technology for hunting seal, walrus and whales off Greenland's coast, was a dying art.

So, in 1983, a group of young Greenlanders banded together and retrieved several kayaks from a museum in the Netherlands. They found elders who still remembered how to build and use kayaks. And, in 1984, they started a club.

Just one year later, more than 1,000 Greenlanders had signed up as members. Some sported t-shirts with the slogan, "Qajaq atoqqilerparput" meaning "Kayak, we are starting to use it again".

Naturally, kayakers here prefer the Greenlandic paddle, which is shorter than a modern kayak paddle, and has the benefit of being buoyant, as it's carved from wood, which helps during the execution of a roll.

And there are lots of rolls, designed to right a capsized boat in all different circumstances. Greenland's kayakers practice these skills each year at the national championships, where competitors demonstrate their kayak prowess.

It starts with the standard Greenland roll, and advance to paddling while upside-down in the water, the "straight-jacket, no-hands roll," and the "walrus pull," which involves five men tugging on a rope attached to the boat while the kayaker attempts to put off capsizing as long as possible.

Heinrich is a past champion. And this month Inouraq Enoksen, 17, will return to the nationals for the second time.

Kayaks built by club members retain the the traditional, sleek design used for millenia, but they are built from modern materials: a wooden frame covered with Kevlar cloth, that's coated with rubberized paint. These kayaks are far lighter, but also far more fragile, than commercially-produced kayaks built from fibreglass.