After a weekend of boasting and ranting in a seminar with my British collagues and travelling too much too bored in trains I decided to slip my job for a day and check few local islands... I did pack the Nordkapp and leave at noon: extra clothes, a thermos of black coffee, mineral water, sandwiches. Besides my usual safety gear, a rain-hat with a really wide brim, pogies, plus mountain climberīs sunglasses with yellowish reflecting lenses and extra leather straps to protect corners of my eyes and my nose. Really, really cool, especially in drizzle ;-) I do wear contact lenses and hate drops of salt water in my eyes if it is getting windy... The wind was something like 12 knots, waves 2' and water temp chilling, as usual. Rain. Gray clouds, gray sea. After getting more to the open I did find the pogies very useful. At the Finnish Gulf the wind turns during the daytime as the sun is moving from SE to west. I was hoping to get a good ride from Helsinki to SW after the wind had risen, normally after midday, and planning to return when the wind would be turning more to the west. Yup, an other good ride, with a water tank filled with 3 gallons of sea water behind my seat as an extra ballast - I had capsized few weeks ago with an almost empty kayak and did not want to test my dry-suit again. The elastic tank fits the space perfectly and doesnt move at all and there is not any air inside. Gray, peaceful and silent. No goddamn jet-skis (too gray, cold and nobody looking at you) and no power boats (no sun to get a nice tan and too cold for cool soft drinks). I paddled peacefully towards SW between some small rocky islets and checked the following waves from the corners of my fancy shades. The whole trip was planned so that if something would go wrong and in the case that I would not be able to get back to my kayak I could swim/drift with my kayak to the nearest islets, towards the coast. Besides the part of the longest crossing before my goal, where the drifting to safety would take quite long time. I had a mobile phone with me to have an extra line of defence. There was this meeting with Mr. and Mrs. Canadian Goose. I landed to some islet, and poor Mr. & Mrs. had some interesting remarks about who was there first. No nest there, otherwise I would have turned back. Certainly, there will be later, but some semi-professional fishermen are using the islet regulary, as a place for resting and camping, so I do think that Mr. & Mrs. goose actually are going to have their home at the protected islets in the neighbourhood. I did count some 17 swans in one group few days before, so these local waters are really crowded at this moment. If you are a bird, I mean. My goal was an island, about one mile long, seven miles to the SW from the capital. It has large, beautiful cliffs, stunted pines and birch, a nice sandy and calm beach. Really undisturbed and beautiful place, maybe because the local policemenīs hunters club has a hut there. Well, the Police is your Friend, I thought when I landed the beach from the downwind side of the island. The wind and the waves had carried me a little bit too much downwind from the island, but it suited me fine. Some of the waves had breaking tops and I felt much better reaching the island with bow and my face against the wind. I did spend the next hour sitting at the cliffs, drinking black coffee, eating my sandwiches and watching through the rain coast guard boat and one two-masted sailboat in the horizon. Strange and beautiful light: no shadows could be seen on the ground. Gray. Just the hissing sound of rain and occasional bursts of something between the clouds, which reminded me of the blue sky. After an hour my dry-suit felt cold inside so I continued paddling. My stomach felt funny: maybe it was the few pints I had at the local last night, together with some cigars, or was it the black coffee? Burp. Belch. Burp. A strange creature kayking in the rain with an enormous rain-hat and shades, letting out funny noises and laughing out loud. Letīs add the effect of some mineral water into that... I continued the paddling, and after an hour the funny feeling went away. During that hour a large four-decked power boat passed by. No friendly hello, no waving, no nothing. Maybe I was looking slightly disturbing there :-) The return route was nearly the same, but I was facing the wind. It had not turned, and the shades were wery useful. I picked up some trash from the islets and went home after 19 miles of paddling. I have quite fast paddling style, 65 to 70 short strokes/minute when touring long distances, so I did amuse myself when trying to figure that days amount of strokes... Until I washed my thermos at home. What was left of the coffee was foaming when I did pour some hot water inside the thermos. Ahem, maybe I should rinse my dishes more carefully, under running water, when I am doing my washing-up. Still on my feet and feeling quite healthy... Cheers, Ari Saarto "Home of the Traditional & Famous Scandinavian Skinny-dipping [TM]" Finland - Europe GSM +358 - 50 - 526 5892 fax. +358 - 3 - 828 2815 e-mail: asaarto_at_lpt.fi *************************************************************************** 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 Jun 02 1998 - 11:37:03 PDT
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