Well folks, the Sea for Cumbria challenge has finally taken to the high seas. Our first bash took us around Walney Island, off the Cumbrian coast at Barrow in Furness, a 20 mile excursion that saw us exposed to all manner of weather conditions from glassy calm (pictured) to high winds and snow (not pictured as it was too rough to start messing on with photos!).The escapees from this trip were Jasper, who had contrived to be terribly ill (a likely tale) and Wendy, who had to be in Newcastle - as you do sometimes. The rest of us turned up early at Roa Island and were again joined by Comrade Nigel, which was a nice surpirse, as well as being a big relief as some of us had never paddled in the sea before.
The first couple of miles, heading North to Barrow were a bit of an 'in at the deep end' introduction to the salty stuff, with turbulent waters caused by a combination of opposing wind and tide and the shape of the channel. Mike and I, who were both sea virgins were to be found out to the side of the group muttering things like 'oh yeah, we're still okay' and 'oh no, oh no, aaaagh, phew, aaagh' to ourselves and hoping that nobody would notice.
Out first stop, at the bridge from Barrow to Walney island, was a regular game of dodgems in boat soup as we battled to get to some dry land and pretend that none of us had been remotely perturbed by our experiences thus far. After a quick shiver on the shore, we set off again with the next stop being on a deserted beach at the North end of Walney island. With just us, a bird colony and 30kg of stuffed pasta that my wife had thoughtfully packed for my lunch ('you'll need the energy darling'...'no, I'm sure you aren't the fattest bloke in the group by far') we were all feeling a bit more 'in the zone'.
Next up, we set off around the tip of the island and, for the first time were confronted by nothing but open sea. The sand banks and winds caused the sea around to to boil up and, from time to time, we'd find outselves perched (usually at a jaunty angle) atop a big wave with only fresh air under the front half of our boats. It was truly exhilarating and, I think we'd all begun to feel the 'adventure' element of the challenge.
As we paddled South, following the West coast of the island, we were treated to alternating sunshine, rain, wind and even snow. Again time for a break, we paddled onto a beach through the surf, with Tom catching the waves just right and hitting the beach at about Mach 2. Here, Mike decided that the day had taken its toll and elected to spend the rest of it drinking beer and watching Steven Seagal movies in the pub - which was the civilised choice given the temperature of the water.
Back in the drink, Mark and Ian contrived to have a collision on top of a breaker, leaving Ian floating around like a neoprene-clad crouton. Nigel decided that this would be a good time for me to practise rescuing people but sadly I was overwhelmed with the dual challenges of staying upright in the surf and emptying Ian's kayak by hauling it over my deck and so I ended up crouton-side too. Luckily the other paddlers in the team aren't such utter muppets, so Nigel rescued Ian and Mark rescued me as we are back underway in 5 minutes flat - slick huh? :-)
The remainder of the paddle was characterised by being cold and tiring, followed by being very cold and tiring. However, just as we were on the final home run to Peil Island and the RNLI station at Roa, we were treated to an audience with the Walney Island seal colony, who swam out to meet us, their amazingly Labrador-like heads popping up between our boats as we dug deep for those last few shreds of energy.
Back on land, we met Mike who informed us that we were within an amazing 90 seconds of the rough schedule that Nigel had mapped out for the day! The day over though, it was all we could do to carry our boats back to the cars while we tried not to think about the 6 successive days of similar effort we'd need to put into the challenge itself!
The first couple of miles, heading North to Barrow were a bit of an 'in at the deep end' introduction to the salty stuff, with turbulent waters caused by a combination of opposing wind and tide and the shape of the channel. Mike and I, who were both sea virgins were to be found out to the side of the group muttering things like 'oh yeah, we're still okay' and 'oh no, oh no, aaaagh, phew, aaagh' to ourselves and hoping that nobody would notice.
Out first stop, at the bridge from Barrow to Walney island, was a regular game of dodgems in boat soup as we battled to get to some dry land and pretend that none of us had been remotely perturbed by our experiences thus far. After a quick shiver on the shore, we set off again with the next stop being on a deserted beach at the North end of Walney island. With just us, a bird colony and 30kg of stuffed pasta that my wife had thoughtfully packed for my lunch ('you'll need the energy darling'...'no, I'm sure you aren't the fattest bloke in the group by far') we were all feeling a bit more 'in the zone'.
Next up, we set off around the tip of the island and, for the first time were confronted by nothing but open sea. The sand banks and winds caused the sea around to to boil up and, from time to time, we'd find outselves perched (usually at a jaunty angle) atop a big wave with only fresh air under the front half of our boats. It was truly exhilarating and, I think we'd all begun to feel the 'adventure' element of the challenge.
As we paddled South, following the West coast of the island, we were treated to alternating sunshine, rain, wind and even snow. Again time for a break, we paddled onto a beach through the surf, with Tom catching the waves just right and hitting the beach at about Mach 2. Here, Mike decided that the day had taken its toll and elected to spend the rest of it drinking beer and watching Steven Seagal movies in the pub - which was the civilised choice given the temperature of the water.
Back in the drink, Mark and Ian contrived to have a collision on top of a breaker, leaving Ian floating around like a neoprene-clad crouton. Nigel decided that this would be a good time for me to practise rescuing people but sadly I was overwhelmed with the dual challenges of staying upright in the surf and emptying Ian's kayak by hauling it over my deck and so I ended up crouton-side too. Luckily the other paddlers in the team aren't such utter muppets, so Nigel rescued Ian and Mark rescued me as we are back underway in 5 minutes flat - slick huh? :-)
The remainder of the paddle was characterised by being cold and tiring, followed by being very cold and tiring. However, just as we were on the final home run to Peil Island and the RNLI station at Roa, we were treated to an audience with the Walney Island seal colony, who swam out to meet us, their amazingly Labrador-like heads popping up between our boats as we dug deep for those last few shreds of energy.
Back on land, we met Mike who informed us that we were within an amazing 90 seconds of the rough schedule that Nigel had mapped out for the day! The day over though, it was all we could do to carry our boats back to the cars while we tried not to think about the 6 successive days of similar effort we'd need to put into the challenge itself!
1 comment:
Well said.
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