[Paddlewise] Sea Cave Carnage

Paddlewisers,











I thought you might enjoy reading about the sea cave carnage that a friend and
I experienced last weekend at Santa Cruz Island in Southern California: 











...Seal Canyon Cave is one of our favorites because it is dark, narrow and
long. The length is 620 feet, which is longer than two football fields. The
width ranges from about 5 to 20 feet. Swells surge into the cave, but they
usually aren't rough because most of the cave is deep. With only a 4 foot
swell we weren't expecting anything rough, but we were approaching an extreme
low tide.





 





All five of us who went in the cave wore headlamps on our helmets, but these
headlamps are not very effective in the sea caves, because all you can see is
a small circle of light for a distance of about 10 feet. Jeff and I had more
powerful dive lights on our front decks to help light the way, and Steve,
Bryant and Dave followed.





 





With a 4-foot swell the cave had more surge than I was expecting, but it
wasn't too rough as we paddled through the dark passage. Near the end of the
cave, I pointed out to Steve, who was behind me, a camber that we use for
turning around in after going to the end of the cave. Only Jeff and I went to
the end of the cave. To get there we had to go through a slot that narrowed
down to about five feet, and we were surprised by the amount of surge going
back and forth through it. Also, once we passed the slot, we were surprised by
how loud the wave action was against the walls and the beach at the very end.
We stopped right there and yelled for the others behind us to back up and turn
around in the chamber I had pointed out to Steve.





 





While Jeff and I were waiting, I realized that paddling backwards through the
surge in the slot wasn't going to be easy. I noticed that there was just
enough room to turn my 15 ½ foot kayak around. After I turned around, Jeff
decided to do the same thing in his 16 foot kayak.





 





Just as Jeff was turned sideways, a strong surge came through and lifted and
pushed him deeper into the narrowing cave. His kayak became bridged across the
walls of the cave and was hanging 3 feet above the water. He tipped over and
wet exited as another big surge knocked his kayak loose.





 





I yelled to the others the Jeff was out of his kayak, but I didn't hear
anything back from them. Later, Steve told me that he heard me, but with their
poor lighting and the amount of surge that was coming through the cave at that
time, they decided to get out of there as fast as they could, and I don't
blame them.





 





In the washing machine environment, I paddled over to Jeff so that we could do
a side-by-side rescue. While getting tossed up and down 3 to 4 feet and back
and forth about 10 to 15 feet, I was leaning over Jeff's kayak and trying to
hold it steady while he was trying to climb back in the cockpit. A combination
of the water turbulence and his knees being sore and stiff from a skiing
accident a couple of weeks ago made it difficult for him to get back in the
cockpit. We struggled for about five minutes, and then he was knocked off the
kayak by another strong surge. He grabbed a hold of his kayak, and I let go of
it to try to hold my position and think of what else we should try, because
the side-by-side rescue wasn't going to work.





 





I had let go of Jeff's kayak for only a few seconds, when all the sudden I was
upside down. I don't know what happened, and I went over so fast that I didn't
even have a chance to brace. I set up for a roll on one side, but when I went
to sweep outward, my paddle was obstructed. Then I set up on the other side,
started to sweep outward, and once again my paddle was obstructed. I was
wedged between a cave wall and Jeff's kayak. Before releasing the sprayskirt,
I spent a couple of seconds dreading the though of having to go for a swim.
Despite the extremely low tide, I was surprised to find myself standing in
only 4 feet of water, which explained why there was so much wave and surge
action with only a 4 foot swell.





 





With the two of us out of our kayaks and getting tossed around, our problem
was compounded, and we were trying to decide the best thing to do. Jeff
noticed that the beach at the end of the sea cave was right behind us, so we
decided to dump the water out of our kayaks on the beach and launch from
there.





 





After dragging our kayaks up the beach and dumping the water out, I launched
first. When I arrived at the slot about 100 feet from the beach, I looked back
to see if Jeff had launched, and with his dive light shining on the front deck
of his kayak, which was angled downward, I could see he was still on the
beach. While I was going up and down in the waves, I yelled for Jeff to go but
he didn't move. I kept yelling back to him about every 30 seconds for a few of
minutes and wondered why he wasn't launching. Finally, he launch and we
paddled out of the cave.





 





Outside of the cave, we laughed at our carnage. I asked Jeff why he took so
long to launch. He said that he couldn't understand what I was saying because
the wave action was so loud, and when he saw my light going way up and down in
the waves at the slot, he figured I was telling him it was too rough to go
yet. We laughed again...











Duane Strosaker





www.rollordrown.com











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