Adventure on the Water
Splashes not included.
It was a beautiful Saturday afternoon so we decided to head out on the water for a kayaking adventure. I had never done the kayak thing before but my intrepid companion was a little more experienced. We called the nice kayak lady, booked the time, jumped into the kayaks and our adventure was on.
We had two options from the harbour starting point:
- Head out into the open water where waves would be bigger and the potential for disaster would be greater.
- Head inland up The Gorge where the waves would be miniscule and the potential for mild adventure would be greater.
We chose option two, and not just because the nice kayak lady sent us that way either. Two hours of adventure here we come!
We were moving quite slow to be honest. Trying to figure out how to paddle smoothly without splashing all over ourselves. Taking a few pictures of the water and banks for the sake of posterity. Watching a raccoon scurrying along the banks.
We had three options while scoping out our path under one of the many bridges we encountered:
- A large opening where the boats travelled.
- A bunch of much smaller openings between the pilings.
- Some of those same openings that were somewhat blocked with a large lumber X that was obviously intended to keep us out.
Of course we chose option three because it was way more fun. That is after all what we were after. No problem.
A little farther along we encountered what the nice kayak lady referred to as a tidal bridge. She said that since the tide was coming in we would have an easy time on the way up and a tougher time on the way back. In simple terms this is a narrow choke point where the water backs up a bit and then pulls through with a little more gusto creating a bit of a current. She suggested we might not want to go beyond that point so naturally you can guess what we did. Let’s hit it with some speed!
Don’t be fooled, it was actually quite mellow. It opened up to a beautiful wide area that was quite calm and very quiet with a large green park on our left. Checking the time we discovered our dawdling along had taken almost an hour and figured we should probably head back. We were getting tired but if we put the hammer down for a bit we should manage to get back in well under an hour. With that in mind we continued to dawdle around for about ten more minutes before heading back.
Our first task was to get back through the tidal bridge area. We decided to follow the banks along the right until we got close then build up some speed before whizzing under the bridge to a glorious victory on the other side. This was a good plan however we forgot to take into account the sideways drift that the current would impose on us. Can you say look out for those rocks? We did manage avoid making contact but it took every ounce of our skill, which wasn’t very much honestly, trying to paddle both forward and to the right at the same time. Whew!
Eventually we came across the bridge with those X areas and noticed some that had an additional piece of lumber straight across underneath it. A few of them had some rocks poking out and were obviously dangerous but others looked good. I think by now you guess which path we chose. Can you say kayak limbo?
Anyway, we made it back to the harbour with a bit of time to spare so we took a few moments to check out the nooks and crannies before heading back to see the nice kayak lady and return all of our gear.
A fun time and a good sun burn was had by all.
Do you like to get outdoors and create a little adventure? What is your favourite outdoor activity? Leave me a comment below.
- The photo in the header is looking back at the tidal bridge in the distance just before we started heading back.
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