I Lead a Paddle?

Life has been getting a little rough as of late and I needed some kayak time - preferable kayak time involving at least the possibility for danger. I kept watching the RICKA message board for someone to post a paddle, but by Thursday I was getting desperate. I couldn’t run the risk of nobody posting, so I took the leap.

The plan was to launch from Ft. Wetherill and paddle towards Beavertail with at least a few people confirmed. (I am not allowed to paddle solo.)

The first thing I did in the pre-launch briefing was make it very clear that I was not leading anything…. I was just a person with a desperate need to paddle. I was more than happy to do whatever the group wanted as long as it involved paddling.

The conditions looked promising in the morning. There was enough swell rolling in to make the rocks between Wetherill and Mackreel Cove interesting. I hoped that it would also make the coast going down towards Beavertail fun as well.

We made our way out of Wetherill hugging the coast to make the most of the conditions. There was plenty of bounce in the water to make the rocks fun and create the illusion of danger. At a minimum it was feeding my need for adrenaline.

We found a nice play spot where waves were breaking over a rock. It was a feature that looked challenging and appeared to offer some level of danger. After a few runs, the feature maintained its fun level but lost its sense of danger.

Fortunately, one of us mistimed a wave just enough to get knocked over. It was a minor thing. Paddler and kayak were unscathed (ego might have been a bit bruised).

The rescue also brought the sense of danger back to the rock and we milked it for all it was worth.

From there we worked our way along the coast playing in any rocks the looked interesting. We  found plenty of opportunities before we got to Mackerel Cove.

From Mackerel Cove to Hull Cove conditions flattened out.

We lunched at Hulls Cove. We hoped to find some surf, but it was pretty dead.

The return paddle was mostly just a touring paddle. We tried to eke out any play opportunities we could find, but they were few and far between.

It was probably best that the return trip was less active.