Day 252, Saturday, 26.09.2009

Beautiful swamp around Lorna’s house area

 

100 km to Windy Harbour were to be covered in one day – as no safe sheltered landing was existing along that coast.

Ok, this meant launching at night, or paddling into the night!  Augusta seemed to be a clean run with no reefs or such in the way at night. It seemed to be more reasonable to make a landing in light in Windy Harbor, which had a bouncy headland and some reefs to overcome before being safe and sound.

 

Terry Bolland took over again on the task of a temporary support crew, and was happy to drive my gear from Augusta to Windy Harbour for that long leg, to make it a bit easier paddling an empty boat. He was coming down from Perth just to do that job! Thanks very much, Terry! You are such a great friend!

 

The forecast was for 10-15 kn north easterlies at night, quite some headwind, but changing to around 5 kn out of various directions around lunch. This should be ok, I guessed, I have an empty boat, and the seas are low with 3 m swell only. You can easily make it!

 

We decided to rise at 12.30, as I liked to be on the water at 1.30am. Uahhhhhh! The night was clear with all stars bright out, the water looked calm, but the moon was gone already. The fresh headwind breeze was clearly noticeable! It could only get better in the early day as forecasted…

 

We picked my kayak from Dorothy, a friendly lady living across the road in Flinders Bay, who allowed us to store the kayak in her front yard, sheltered from the street.

Lorna was up with us, to wave me good bye at the beach. It was a nice long stay at her comfortable house, with great hospitality, healthy food and some good talks. Thanks, Lorna!

 

But Lorna and Terry could go to bed again after I was launched, and I was on my own in the clear, calm, but breezy night.

 

I could paddle ok, as there was sufficient light with the stars, and I picked a particular one for navigation. Just the empty boat felt for sure more wobbly than usual on occasional breaks. Can’t say I like that feeling very much…

 

The speed at night is always a bit lower than in similar conditions at daytime, maybe due to normal tiredness, or you simply don’t dig in that deep in darkness. When the first light came up at around 5.30am, I had covered only 15 km…was that well worth the effort getting up that early? The fresh headwind wasn’t making things easier…

 

Nature called at around 6.30. I was hoping to get around that task today and my bowels would stay dormant like on the Zytdorp cliffs overnighter. But on the cliff’s previous paddling day I was probably eating not as much and was too stressed all night long to have a regular digestion in the morning.

 

On other night paddles around the top I had short lycra pants on, it was warm weather, calm water, I had a loaded boat and /or my outrigger floats to stabilize. I was always able to stick my legs out of the cockpit, laying half on the back deck while pulling my pants down and one leg out of my pant, straddle the cockpit of the kayak and to do the job on my seat pad. Lifting the whole thing overboard then and washing it off was easy and no mess at all.

 

But this morning I had a tight fitting long surf skin pant on, the boat was empty and felt quite unstable on the choppy seas on top of a low 3m swell, it was chilly and deploying my floats would be quite a job.

I am peeing all night/ day anyway into my pants and cockpit, and occasionally rinse pants and cockpit with a good amount of sea water and dry everything out with my sponge. This was easy, and in chilly conditions actually the highlight of the day, switching occasionally “the cockpit heating on” …well, if there won’t be the chilly rinse after a while…

 

But what to do with number two today? It is so easy, if you are in tune with your body…simply stick your (freezing cold…) hand between your legs inside the pant, release a decent amount into your hollow hand not to make it a mess on pants and body on pulling it out, and washing it quickly off overboard. Then repeat, until you feel you are done…no problem…

The German proverb of “…in die hohle Hand geschissen…” becomes a literally new meaning in this way J

 

It was time at 7.30am to fill up again with a decent breakfast…muesli with milk powder, the usual stuff.

 

Around 9am, the wind went down to maybe 10 kn only, it felt like I could speed up quite a bit, and my estimated arrival time became within reach of still daylight. So just keep on paddling! The forecast said the wind will be down to 5 kn soon, and it was down around 11am…for about one hour of easy paddling. Then it lifted again to about 10 kn south east, a direct headwind, and breezed up occasionally to 15 kn! Hmmmmmm…..

Nothing really strong, actually, but not what I was expecting either…and my speed went down again plus the estimated arrival time up, about two hours or even more into the night…

 

I checked the map for alternatives, and saw a track coming down to Black Head. Regarding the overall low swell, I had some hope to land on the almost unprotected coast with not too much of a problem. I tried to reach Terry frequently all afternoon on mobile and sat-phone, but when I eventually got him he told me he had checked with locals and that track was inaccessible during winter time…so I decided to keep on plugging.

 

But was it for the little paddling time I spent on the water the last week, or for the unusual night paddling, or I just became a wimp anyway over times, my wrists were aching that much around 4 pm I decided before it’s getting worse, I give it a break on shore and see where I can get in. I really had some hope in this low swell the landing would be more or less easy!

 

Making that decision, I was 6 km off the coast, and it was around 4.45 pm. I gave Terry a call on the radio at about 4 km offshore about I’ll be going in. Maybe I’d launch again after an hour of rest or so…but basically I was mentally prepared to stay a night on the beach by myself with not much equipment, if Terry wouldn’t be able to get to that beach with all my gear. It all felt better than keeping on plugging into another night with some headwinds and quite aching wrists…

 

I knew I passed on the basic safety rule to carry at least a set of dry clothes, 1st aid and repair material, and some shelter for an unexpected emergency landing. There won’t be any unexpected landing, as the coastline and surf won’t allow me to land anyway and what are 100 km of paddling for such an experienced and determined long distance paddler like me? I’d do that leg with ease…

 

Well, I obviously felt that day it was better risking a landing on an open surf beach and staying a night out with few gear than to keep on paddling another 30 km into the next night…

 

I neared the beach, and saw nothing of any surf than a bit of an occasional “little” dumper…what I expected. Good timing, and you’ll be in with ease in that mostly merely dripping water onto that beach in that low swell! But on the other hand experience told me never underestimate the surf…amazingly on the east coast I always “overestimated” it!

 

I paddled closer and closer…at least I noticed there was no advantage to make it directly to the Meerup River mouth, as the surf seemed to be a bit messier there and I didn’t know if there was enough water in that river mouth to paddle in.

 

I picked a gutter spot where I hardly saw any dumper spilling on shore at any time, and worked my way in. To the right and to the left breakers started eventually to roll in – where the hell did they come from at all in this low swell? But luckily there were no breakers on my path…until I was almost safe on shore!

 

Then, for sure, the odd one caught me, I was able to hang in there with a desperate high brace, but I felt like being lifted up about three times in the air like a flat pebble thrown over the water’s surface to make it jump. In kangaroo manner, almost lying on my right side, I eventually sat high and dry on the beach. But no capsize!

 

Looking on the actually quite heavy surf around me, I was quite proud about my landing. I really picked an almost calm 30 m wide calmish gutter! To the right and to the left, about 6 lines of breakers were rolling in onto this quite shallow part of the beach. Later I saw further up the beach heavy dumpers crashing onto shore, where it was steeper and no good place to be at all.

 

 

There I was, safely landed, and I contacted Terry via radio that I was ok. He asked me if I’d be ok for a night out on the beach with no gear? Yes, for sure, I’m ready for that if I decide not to launch again, and I was actually looking almost forward to the new adventurous task on surviving a chilly night out in wet gear with not much shelter…I couldn’t expect Terry to try to get through the high dunes on suspicious 4-wheel tracks to meet me with my gear…but there are quite some very fresh wheel tracks on the beach, they must have come from some where?        

 

Terry, an adventurous soul himself, but with not too much 4-wheel driving experience, felt obviously challenged to make it out there in this “emergency” case, and started to check with locals on possible tracks regarding my landing spot at Meerup River mouth.

 

Grabbing my basic safety equipment like map, GPS, VHF radio, mobile and sat-phone plus some lights, I was walking eastwards about 1 km to the river mouth, following the wheel tracks, but they seemed to end all somewhere and to actually come from rather west. I walked another 2 km westwards, it turned dark by then, but I spotted a light on the beach in the distance. But I really couldn’t tell how far away it would be, maybe some fishermen or odd campers out there…and decided I’d rather stay with my boat and wait for Terry to make it to the beach or not.

 

I tried to make myself at home in my boat, in good cheerful spirits, almost laughing about my situation. If you are too much of a wimp to keep on paddling those last 30 km into the night, you better may think this is going to be a funny task here!

 

I pulled the kayak up a high flat dune spot with some effort, and I took stock of the situation what I had for shelter: I had my wet, but fleecy warm paddling shirt, pants and socks on, with a windproof Gore Tex anorak on top, the head covered with two thin scarves and the windproof hood. There was the PFD to put on, the neoprene spray deck and my open palm mitts for chilly hands. I could sit in the boat on dry land now, like on my big crossing of the Gulf of Carpentaria, my bum padded and kept warm by sitting on an half inflated paddling float, plus leaning on another half inflated paddling float. Quite comfortable, actually! I had the cockpit cover to wrap over my upper body for additional warmth, plus to cover my face from the bright moonlight! That was all I had! Must be enough…and I actually started to nap away, being very tired from the early launch. I was just hoping not to wake in the middle of the night and to think I may be afloat with no stabilization and close to capsize…

 

I saw a light flashing around the corner of my beach – was that Terry already? I was almost disappointed as I was just about to get comfortable and to think this was a funny adventure…later I learnt some 4-wheel driving freaks was just missing me and turned around 500m before my beach “camp”.

 

But as I had agreed to call Terry about his progress on finding a track and making it over the dunes after 45 min, and my nap was lasting only 10 min or so…and I started to shiver a bit anyway…

 

I reached Terry, and he said he was about to make it! He found the track to Warren Beach west of me, and was now struggling a bit to get over the top of the dunes…later he told me he actually found those local 4-wheel drive freaks, half drunk on a Saturday night’s camp out, who eventually drove his car for him over the dune’s top then – thanks! – but he was about to be on the beach!

 

I felt I couldn’t ask him to drive about 2,5 km along the quite soft sandy beach then, as I saw on the earlier walk it may be quite a job, even with balloon wheels, and I was quite freezing by now and actually very happy to hear I didn’t had to stay out by myself all night…so I decided to leave my kayak, took my safety gear and started to walk west again, PFD and spray deck still on for additionally warmth.

 

After about 2 km walking in darkness on very soft deep sand and getting quite hot by now, I saw that light again, and then some more lights – this must be some cars! I contacted Terry again on the VHF, and he said it was his car flashing now on the beach! He made it over the dune’s top with the help of some local campers…thank goodness…I’ll be soon dry and warm in my tent! Thanks, Terry, to make that night’s effort to get to that beach in darkness!

 

We put up camp right were the car was, and I was happy about a freezing cold shower with enough fresh water. Soon I was crashing in my warm and dry sleeping bag in my tent…almost too tired to cook a decent dinner! So it must be crackers, cheese and butter only…enough for that night.

 

And I’ll never launch without sufficient emergency gear and think I’ll make it to the meeting point with ease when I’ll have someone supporting me…you never know!

 

Text message from Freya:

34.39 115.52, Meerup River mouth. 1:30 am to 6:00 pm, 80 km. Enough for today!

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