Today was King Tide day – the water in Hervey Bay came up wayyyyyyyy over the normal limit – walls were damaged, beaches were simply gone, the harbour was flooded.
But it could have been worse here, no flooding in the streets. Some houses were already sandbagged, but even a heavy rain didn’t really occur. Luckily, Cylone Hamish just turned off to the Northern tip of Fraser Island, without hitting Hervey Bay too much. Anyway, it was blowing more than 30-40 kn since Monday afternoon, and lots of branches were fallen off the trees in the streets. I wonder if my tent would have survived on an beach somewhere out there…probably the beach would have been gone anyway where I would have been camping on. TV pictures show sea and land conditions in further north areas you just don’t want to be in…I was really lucky to stop here in the safe and comfortable shelter of Janita and David’s house. Thanks again to them for hosting me!
Janita and I were driving around a bit, she says all years she has been living here the normally sheltered Hervey Bay has never seen such massive moving water – it was brown and muddy everywhere, with bits and pieces floating around. Long swell made some quite big dumpers crashing on a normally quiet beach. The water in Great Sandy Strait was full of massive whitecaps, as it was normally flat as well.
I took my time off to prepare my trip further up north. My next pit stop will be in Mackay, Victor and Alyth Jordan are already waiting to pick me up for a night and/ or day. Thanks!
Then I have a contact on Magnetic Island near Townsville, and the last stop before heading out of the “real” civilization will be in Cairns. I will pack a food parcel to be sent to Restoration Island, halfway between Cairns and Cape York. This will take me around the tip to Weipa, where I’ll start my crossing of the Gulf of Carpenteria.
I fiddled a bit with ideas how to get quality sleep on the 6-7 day, 530 km long crossing. First important thing is to pick the right weather window to have some more or less quiet water.
I’ll take off with three paddles. For sleeping, two of them will be simply strapped across the boat on small foam pads, one before, one behind the cockpit. Like you strap your boat to a roof rack, just upside down. The paddle blades will have large solid inflatible floats on the ends to make a stable platform with even two outriggers each side. One cross strapped paddle with floats would be enough to not be able to capsize the setupanymore. I’ll carry a spare float as well as the third paddle just in case one is breaking.
Now I can move around on the platform, open hatches to grab stuff and make myself comfortable. As I have a regular boat with a normal position of the bulkheads, I won’t slip inside the boat lying on the ground to sleep inside it like in a coffin, but prefer a setup on top of the boat. I could still stay seated with legs inside the cockpit, and lie quite comfortable on the backdeck with my butt lifted on a pillow. Or seated with my bodycrunching forward hugging a beachball. These may be even temporary resting positions, if I feel I need it.
But the real comfortable space is ON the kayak. I’ll pad the seat with my big tent bag and an inflatable pillow up to cockpit level. Then I’ll cover the cockpit with my normal nylon cover to prevent to fill up the boat with water over night, plus my solid neoprene spraydeck, to take a bit stress out of the nylon cover only. The whole “bed” will be topped with my thermarest, strapped to the boat, and voilà, it’s comfortable bedtime! Another gear bag serves as a pillow tied to the back deck, and I’ll wear my padded PFD for safety and padding the gap between the cockpit and dayhatch a bit more. I’ll secure myself with a strap from the boat to my PFD, and reckon for myself I won’t fall of the setup on sleeping…
A sea anchor keeps the boat more or less put and the nose into the wind. Maybe I won’t use it, when waves are not too annoying and the wind pushes me into the right direction anyway. Won’t be too bad to cover some distance whilst sleeping…
Two GPS will be on board, Sat phone for live reporting and weather messages, SPOT and epirb. I am thinking about getting a “Shark Shield” just for the sleeping hours to ease the mind even a bit more. We’ll see.
I’ll probably wear a fleece layer on top and legs plus neoprene socks, which are all warm whilst wet, plus a windbreaker anorak. Even in warm nights and water on sleeping it needs to be warm whilst probably being wet…
I can lie on my side or even on my stomach to relax my backside from all day’s paddling, and even dry out my skin a bit, if necessary.
Any thought or ideas from you guys???
11 comments on “Day 52, Tuesday, 10.03.2009”
Freya,
I love reading your posts, you are my favorite celebrity Kayaker. I hope you can get pictures of your sleeping arrangement and can’t wait to see how it works. When ever I think of a grand adventure like this, I always wonder how to sleep on the crossing. Good luck, and as my Martial arts instructor always says..”keep going.” 🙂
There is actually a kayak built for sleeping. It is called VKV Seagull Ocean. The bulkhead is moved forward. As stabilizers there are pontones attached to a shaft on each side. The interesting solution is that behind the cockpit there is a pipe in glas fiber going from one side to the other. It is open in both end to allow the shafts to be pushed in a bit. This makes it VERY stable.
The good thing is that you can attach the pipe in any kayak – but you need to do a proper job and make the connection very strong. A craftsman used to do plastic job can easily do it in a couple of hours.
I have such a pipe attached to all my three kayaks as an extra security when paddling longer distances over open sea. My intention is not to use them for sleeping, more just as an extra security.
On this Swedish site you might find some pictures showing self rescue using such a pontone. http://www.vitudden.com/self_rescue_2_se/self_rescue_2_se.html
Good luck
Peter
I like the idea of towing a bed, sorry spare light weight kajak, behind and attatching it like a catamaran with bamboo poles. It sound like a lot of mucking about with the paddles. Sleep is going to be the most important thing on that crossing, if you’re not fully with it, a small problem turns into a monster. Look after the head as well as the body.
Good luck
Edda
would you consider towing a small inflatable life raft? Tie it to the kayak at night, put out a sea anchor and you can get some sleep without fear of turning over. When you get to the other side of the Gulf of Carpenteria you can disgard (in an enviormently sound way of course) and finish the trip without it—given the light weight and shallow draft, it shouldn’t slow you down too much when you tow it.
Hi Freya, I’m an Aussie paddler, I’ve lived in the north for 10’s of years, I’ve also lived in the South for 10 yrs.
Neoprene socks are not such a good idea, neoprene is designed to keep you warm by trapping a layer of water between your skin and the neoprene, when one is underwater this works well, however when one is on the surface the wind blowing across the neoprene chills the water and ones body is constantly fighting to keep the area warm. When one is active it’s not noticed but when one is at rest the blood slows and a chill sets in. 1st and 2nd layer fleece would be better, ie inner and outer fleece.
With the paddles, make sure they’re not too long, if they stick out from the boat too much an inordinate amount of force can be applied resulting in them snapping very easily. Sponsons
( http://www.harmonygear.com/sea-kayak-sponsons ….( there are others… )) that one blows up and attaches to clips on the side of the boat work well. These will also work well in rough water whereas paddles and floats may be problematic. I use sponsons.
In regards to the sea anchor keeping you “put” be aware you’ll be in some serious tidal waters and your sea anchor is very likely to scoot you along at quite a speed, you may well find that you travel INTO the wind, tide speeds of 8 knots are not uncommon !
( http://www.cmar.csiro.au/e-print/open/CMReport_139.pdf )From the air it seems the islands are steaming along as a flotilla ! Make sure you’re not heading shore wise. It may pay to study the lunar cycles and use them to your advantage, a few days before the full moon may work well as the tides may be a bit slacker and you’ll be able to see well at night, this means you can sleep, paddle, sleep paddle according to your bio rhythm, this can be carried on throughout daylight hours as well. I’m not so sure about sleeping on top of the boat as it’ll be easy for your legs to slip overboard, it’s your call, you know your abilities and limitations but think about it.
Make sure your skin is well healed prior to heading North of Cairns, if it’s not you’ll stand a very real chance of developing tropical ulcers if it’s still hot and this will put a real dampener on your day believe me. I suggest you wear your sprayskirt in order to minimise the ingress of water to the cockpit thereby giving your skin a better chance of survival.You may wish to get a nylon 25mm 90 degree bend that you fit through the deck and then have it facing aft, this will help to vent hot air from in the cockpit but also slow the ingression of water.
OK, take care, Good Luck
Al
Freya, all this drama with sleeping on the yak could be alleviated if you track the coastline of the Gulf of Carpentaria and find places to camp at night. By avoiding the coastline you haven’t really paddled around Australia, as you will be leaving out nearly 1700ks of the continent. If crocs are a concern to you, speak to me as I’ve spent many years paddling with big crocs in the Gulf’s rivers and can offer some useful advice. You will need a rifle however as from experience, crocs love kayaks and will regularly charge and you’ll need to defend yourself from attack. Good luck no matter which way you go but if you enjoy a challenge, follow the coastline around. That’s the way I would do it!
Rick
Well I lived many years in the Philippines and outriggers are the one to help you out. Instead of bamboo you can also use a sewerpipe that is closed on both sides. As you want to use your paddles to have contact with the stabelizer/sewerpipe, I would replace these two by bamboopoles. It’s strong and more important flexible. And can be easily taken under your elastics on deck. And while on the water, you can adjust etc,,,easily in this kind of material.
To tie them up, you can try innertubes from a truck/car. Cut them into rings and take enough with you, it works better than tieraps…and they are also flexible.
In order to adjust the poles to your kayak…you have the rings around your boat..maybe it will give some reduce of speed, but you have to make a compromise if you want to close your eyes for a little while, and it only takes a few days.
Just like a cross-bandage and you can put the poles in the elastic tuberings.
Well make sure you have the SPOT on your body/PFD at all time!
Well if you want to be a Cowboy, you have to think like a Indian.
Paddle to the Metal, Freya
Regards Jörgen
Freya i would test out this idea many times in the coming month in different waters, to make sure paddles are strong enough to be stabelizers since you be top heavy laying on the deck there be more strain on the paddles ,anyway try calm water and rougher water to find out things you have not tought about and getting a secure feeling.
Freya, the Shark Shield is a good idea as i’ve not seen this number of sharks about in my 48 years. I was followed and circled by a 2.5m + tiger shark on 30/12/08 while on my surf ski (in NSW) and know you only get one chance.
The Shark Shield is reported to be good for swimmers, while there is talk that shield may not work on a moving kakak or ski. There is also talk that they may attract sharks from a distance away, but once the shark gets close the shield makes the shark uncomfortable and go away (if your craft is stationary while using the shield). I doubt that the shield will be effective with a frenzy.
Best wishes for your adventure. I’ll keep following your updates. Michael
I own the boat that Ed Gillet paddled to HI. He removed the bulkhead between the two cockpits of his stock Tofino. so he could sleep inside. Water entered the cockpit at night and he got very little sleep. Even though you are sleeping on top, make sure your cockpit is well sealed. I also understand that his “inflatable” outriggers were not totally satisfactory. Your method of strapping paddles to your kayak might slip unless you have some method (eyelets?) to keep them secure. You may experience some difficulty pulling your kayak ashore after several days of not walking. You’ll make it, Gary
Sounds quite a precarious platform if there’s any chop. Be sure to try it out for a night before the crossing. Have you considered towing a second kayak? You could bring it alongside at night like a catamaran and form a platform on top. Just a thought.
Also you’d need a lot of batteries for the sharkshield. I’d keep one switched off and ready to be switched on in emergencies only. Best wishes, Simon
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