Dave Reynolds wrote: > Did anyone have any memorable kayak trips over the Memorial weekend? Not epic, but a nice day on the water... On Saturday we decided to paddle out to Bull Island in Cape Romain National Wildlife Sanctuary. Weather was fine for the trip. On the advice of Chris at Coastal Expeditions, we opted for the northern route from Garris landing: across the ICW, through the marsh out to the mouth of Anderson Creek, then a 2 mile crossing across Bull Bay to Northeast Point on Bull. Nice crossing, just a little bit of a breeze from the south that I could keep straight in without any problems, although Belita had to work hard to overcome the weathercocking of her Sparrow Hawk. This surprised me, because I have paddled that boat in some stiff winds and not weathercocked at all. Maybe the weight difference. We arrived at the point about 1:30 and set off walking around the point and down the ocean side of the island. Like Capers, Bull is moving inland, and dropping a maritime forest into the sea. The boneyard is much narrower than Capers Island, the next one south, but quite dense in places. Chris had warned us that the north end of the island was "buggy," and we noticed that if we walked near the dune line, we were frequently buzzed by something, but no big deal. Yet. After a while we reached the place where the north road interescts the beach, and stopped for lunch. From up on the road we could see the interior of the island, which up there is mostly pond and marsh. No alligators in sight, which disappointed me, as they are plentiful on the south end of the island and a naturalist had told me that the big ones--like 14 feet and over--lived on the north end. While gazing over the scenery, I happened to look down and see a shiny, streamlined, triangular fly on the back of my hand. As I brushed him off, blood flew everywhere. I realized that he was some sort of sucking beast with anaesthetic and anticoagulant in his saliva, since I hadn't felt the bite at all. Must be time to get along up the road. We decided to follow the road parallel to the beach rather than re-tracing out steps. It was quite scenic, but the flies got denser and denser, and toward the end we were racing along, swatting each other to keep from being bitten through out shirts. Meg and I had head nets, which helped some. The 31% DEET on my hands, in contrast, didn't do diddly. Arriving back on the beach still mostly perfused, we headed back with a freshening southerly breeze. Belita still struggled, and Meg got a little concerned. I tried to clip onto Belita's bow with my short tow line, but ended up with it jammed into my rudder, so I dropped it and we just went on. The seas were a little over a foot, and occassionally one broke onto your shoulder, so you had to react a little. When we arrived at the marsh on the other side, we found ourselves about 1/2 a mile north of where we needed to be, due to drift from the wind, and had to claw our way back south into it. Belita was pretty knackered, so I clipping in with my long towline and towed her back down to the shelter of Anderson Creek. By that time I was a little knackered myself. It was a pretty calm paddle then back to the landing, at least until we got to the last 100 yards. We had just passed a bald eagle sitting on a ruined dock. Meg was about 50 yards ahead of me, paddling through very shallow water, and suddenly started to shriek and flail her arms about. "What is it?!" I cried, but she was too agitated to find the words. She quieted down, then shrieked again, then again as she drove her boat onto the shore and jumped out. I was afraid that she had gotten into a jellyfish or something spiny, but then she yelled "It's a fish! In my PFD! Come get it out! And NO LAUGHING!" Yeah, right, no laughing. Especially when a 4 inch mullet came flying out of the top of her PDF and landed in the water, stunned. It had jumped into her PDF at the neck, jumped up and hit her in the face, and fallen back in the PDF. A little excitement to close out a pleasant day on the water. Steve Cramer Athens, GA *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
OK, I can't top Steve's fish in the PFD post but... I need some off-topic, non-paddling-related advice from some folks with experience working with epoxies and wooden boats. If anyone wouldn't mind answering a few questions via email, please reply to me back channel. Thanks in advance, Keith *************************************************************************** PaddleWise Paddling Mailing List - Any opinions or suggestions expressed here are solely those of the writer(s). You must assume the entire responsibility for reliance upon them. All postings copyright the author. Submissions: PaddleWise_at_PaddleWise.net Subscriptions: PaddleWise-request_at_PaddleWise.net Website: http://www.paddlewise.net/ ***************************************************************************
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