Re: [Paddlewise] Launching in dumping surf

Many years ago I played in the surf on a fiberglass SOT kayak before 
knowing that kayaks came from the Northern cold countries, that sea 
kayaking was a world sport and that there was so much theory and academy 
and practice and courses and videos and clubs and you name it.

I was afraid of staying outside the breakers or in between without being 
able to swim back out. So I decided to tie a string from my kayak to my 
belt, to my leg and sometimes around my waist.

I also didn´t know that there were dumping waves and smooth waves: Guess 
where I was.. right.. I was in one of the worst dumping waves place that I 
know, close to Ixtapa Zihuatanejo in the Pacific Ocean.

The result was that I succeded in coming out to the beach pulled by my 
kayak which was carried with tremendous force tby the white soup. The 
second result was that, one time, the string wrapped around my leg and I 
had a lot of pain since the string was burning my skin and a big bruise 
stayed around for few days. I was happy it was not my neck.

Immediately after that I decided to look into the just starting technology 
of internet to see if there was something there about kayaking in the 
sea.  I was astonished by this overwhelming amount of knowledge and 
information and the many years of this sport.

Anyway, the point I am trying to make is that all this happened when I was 
coming back, not paddling out. The kayak lost direction and was tumbled and 
hit by waves in all directions and the pulling force was astonishing.

Now, swimming out, with the bow aligned to the waves, with a constant 
direction of pull by the swimmer, seems to me that it should work. 
Somewhere I read something like that in a trip report, of somebody afraid 
of capsizing with his loaded boat, preferred swimming out and entering 
afterwards.  I´ll try to look for the reference.

Best Regards

Rafael
www.mayanseas.com
http://community.webshots.com/user/cayucochief
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