Dave Kruger and his charming, witty, and gracious SO Becky Smith invited me for a Sunday paddle to celebrate my 50th. birthday. We started at the Pig 'N' Pancake in Astoria where Dave seems to be on a first name basis with most of the help and the half of the customers who actually live in Astoria. Our intinerary was to paddle with the ebb from Knappa Dock downstream to the East Basin Moorage. This was a new concept to me: We were going to shuttle the cars and paddle one-way. I've never had the social skills to get the car shuttle routine down. . . probably why I don't do a lot of white-water yakking. Having put away the best that "The Pig" has to offer, we parked Becky's car at the East Basin and then drove the boats to Knappa for the launch at about 8:30 AM. At the Knappa Dock we met three students from OSU who were doing a Common Tern population study for the area. One of the objectives of their study is to extrapolate the population and then compute the biomass energy required to support the flocks. These figures can presumably be applied to fish populations and sport gamefish regulation. But mostly it's data for an M.A. thesis. My initials aren't G.A.B. for nothing, and seeing as how it's my 50th. birthday, and how waitresses at "The Pig" keep the coffee cups filled, I was rattling endlessly about life, aging, insight, the weather, and nearly everything else while getting into the boat. Sitting on the rear coaming, I managed to shift my weight to the wrong gunwale and dive sidelong into the water. Sort of a half-century baptism, I suppose! Beck waited as Dave and I dumped out my cockpit and got underway. This was my first time out with Becky in her spanking new Eddyline Sea Star --a bright yellow-over-white model she calls "Sunny Side Up" or "Fast Eddy." Dave kept kidding Becky about putting a drogue chute on her stern so we could keep up with her. It's a very nice boat, much faster than her old Aquaterra. We headed north from the Knappa Dock across the glass smooth water. Lot's of Scaups --which being French Canadian, I call "scopes." Dave and Becky call them "scalps." Rounding the first island (We won't be specific. It's a secret!), we started moving into a fog bank. This prompted a re-run of most of the thread here in Paddle-Wise about crossings in the fog. Although far removed from the shipping lanes, there was still the possibility of meeting a motor-boat out fishing. Dave and Becky have compasses on deck (I do too, since this trip.), and our strategy was to find a marker buoy and then set a course for another buoy a few miles down river. We rafted together to compare charts and to dig odds and ends out of cockpits, to adjust clothing and paddling positions. While we were doing this, the fog moved west a ways and we had clear paddling using a shore line for bearings. But for a while there, my real concern was our getting separated and trying to navigate in a dense fog. Onward! Dave keeps this route secret because of the wildlife. Actually there's a shoal out of sight of land that's populated with gorgeous sirens. We tie tie ourselves to the bungies, and Becky tows us through the area while wearing her ear plugs. It's a secret and mystical route, and a dangerous stretch for young sailors. Dave likes to keep the route a secret because of his overweaning concern for the safety of others. . . Moving right along. . . The birds were thick on the water. We spotted several bald eagles, actually saw two standing in the deep grass on the shoreline, a hawk or two, some herons, several loons, grebes, mergansers, cormorants, Canada geese, scaups, surf scoters. (I call them "scooters" because of the way they take off.) River traffic was heavy with tugs pulling barges. We made more or less a bee-line for the tip of Tongue Point and eventually ran into the sand shoals between the North Channel and the Woody Island Channel. (Out by the sirens!) Although several miles from shore in all directions, we soon were reduced to stepping out of the boats and pulling them behind us through the ankle deep water. Out here in the middle of the shoals and sunshine we stopped for lunch. Becky decided to sit in her pretty new yellow Sea Star while Dave and I stood in the soft sand and scanned the area with our binoculars (sirens). After eating, we headed a bit south toward deeper water and then took up the heading for Tongue Point once again. By this time there were several fishing boats (recreational) near the point. One small boat seemed to have no one aboard. We whistled a bit and managed to scare up the occupant, seemingly napping/sunning somewhere toward the bow judging from the set of the hull. I was a bit surprised at the distance to the East Mooring Basin from Tongue Point. I had confused the basin with the western Naval docks just on the other side of the point. The paddle was just the right length. Becky was starting to poop out a bit (so we could keep up with her!) and as we rounded Tongue Point, the wildlife thinned as we entered the east end of Astoria. Gliding past the cannery at the entrance to the Basin, we talked to a man on the pier waiting for a fishing boat to come in. The rock jetty at the Basin is a favorite haul-out of Sea Lions--largely because of the nearby cannery. Dave barked at them and managed to get most of them off the rocks and into the water. There were perhaps two dozen Sea Lions. I'd never been this close to them. They're about the size of a Volkswagen. As they'd surface they'd look at Dave barking, then I'd bark and they'd look toward me, then dive. Becky stayed way away from them. As I said at the outset. This shuttle stuff is all new to me. Dave factitously reminded me not to forget my keys before heading back to pick up the other cars--and a good thing too. I keep the keys and my ID in the spray skirt and had removed it and stowed it in the boat. Almost left the keys behind! Dave notes that we first started paddling together October 18, 1997. Before that I just horsed around for six months in a "Pokey" on the Willamette. This trip is one of the first I've done in warm, sunny weather. It's nice to be able to put on the wet-suit without getting wet from the rain in the process. It was a good day for a 50th birthday. Thanks Dave! Thanks Becky! I had a swell time! *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List Submissions: paddlewise_at_lists.intelenet.net Subscriptions: paddlewise-request_at_lists.intelenet.net Website: http://www.gasp-seakayak.net/paddlewise/ ***************************************************************************Received on Tue Apr 21 1998 - 21:39:29 PDT
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