Welcome To Go Sea Kayak

Welcome To The Go Sea Kayak Blog...
This Blog is A Record Of My Personal Adventures And Wonderful Kayaking Lifestyle. It Is Also A Taster Of What You Can Expect If You're Adventurous Enough To Tag Along. Why Not Get In Touch And Join One Of Go Sea Kayaks Guided Trips On The Beautiful Mediterranean Island Of Sardinia, You Won't Regret it!

Monday 31 October 2011

Something For The Ladies ;D

Back in the Swellie's again today with the intention of practicing some moving water skills & boy does it move.

I've also added lots of action shots of yours truly for all my lady admirers, (I Wish! LOL).

Setting off from Port Daniel again Except this time I hitting the water at Low Water Liverpool so I'll be paddling the flood with the flow going East this time.
I am kinda wondering how I'm gonna get under the bridge with the flow & 25mph winds against me?
Wasn't too bad, a bit of shore hugging & a few hard strokes & I was through. You can see in this image just how fast the flow is & I'm hitting it at peak flow too.
What surprised me a little was the eddy currents, some of them literally spin in circles & are tricky to paddle through.
Gonna come back to this spot later, let it build up a bit first. Another surprising thing is how quickly the waves change. There was three distinct rapids in this area when I returned, the strongest on the left, then the middle & the weakest on the right.
Within minutes the one on the right had died away leaving the middle strongest before all the waves died down.
this seems a feature of the swellie's, grab the moment when you can & then move onto the next spot.
 Heres a few action shots, like I said, something for the ladies (LOL).










Breaking In...

Inside Turn

A fab few hours on the water & a great playground :)

Sunday 30 October 2011

Badly Named Island...

Dawn & a perfect sunrise to start the day. I felt I could not come to Anglesey & fail to paddle out to Puffin Island. Its a magical place where the Puffins seem to be bald, fat & grey?
In fact a rat epidemic caused the Puffins to leave this place & these days offers sanctuary to lots of inquisitive seals & a lot of sea birds.
I set off from the scenic lay by at Penmon, its only a short paddle but it is a good one.
The shipwreck at Penmon with Puffin Island in the distance. The waves here were tiny but I was catching them with little effort? As I got closer the wreck created a large lee from the tide & getting back into the flow was fun with some small standing waves.
Trwyn Du Lighthouse...

I practiced my ferry gliding by lining the beacon up with the South tip of the Island.
 I was expecting seals on the South beach & I wasn't disappointed.
Some Cormorants too.
 Cheeky Chappy.
 Back on the North Side.
And feeling the wind a bit now. Instantly blown backwards if I take a picture.
Not far now though I'm having to work hard into a headwind.

As I write this I'm camped near to the Swellies for tomorrow mornings action, need to get some moving water practice ready for my 5 star training on Skye in a couple of weeks time :)

Friday 28 October 2011

Me, Myself & The Ebb Tide...

Back to paddling by myself today & with a huge tide I decided to head for the swellies at peak flow which is around 8 knots on the ebb.
Here you can see the blue & white boat facing into the ebbing tide & the white boat facing into the back eddy.
 It's looking like being a nice paddle.
I play in the flow under the bridges for a bit, practicing breaking in & out, spins & ferry gliding.
 The fisherman seem quite interested as I mess around in the current.
The tides really staring to shift as I pass the Cardinal marker.
Surfing...
I'd put a little video together but at 50 mega bytes it would take about 9 hours to upload on my dongle so I snatched a few stills instead.

More Surfing...





Trying to get on another ride as the waves die down....

Not huge waves which was surprising given the size of the tide & hitting it at peak flow. I suspect I need to arrive earlier when the waters deeper, will have to find out :)

Hmmm, where to next?

Taran's Bloody Awesome Day Out!!! :) :D ;D

Quite Simply the best day's paddling I've ever had & I've had some pretty awesome paddles over the years.
This trip had everything, stunning scenery, amazing rockhopping, terrifying tide races & huge spring tides. What more could you want?

I was paddling with Jen's again today on his last day before heading back to greenland.
The night before at South Stack...

The plan was to paddle from Trearddur Bay to South Stack & go Surfing on the standing waves there.
We did a spot of rockhopping on the way out of Trearddur Bay, you can just make out Jen's in the picture.
 Oooer, Penrhyn Mawr, though its not meant to run on the Ebb.
 Jen's pop's his helmet on just in case. I do the same :)
 Jen's on the outside of the middle rock.
We spot some waves moving a little further out & head for them & admiring the view of South stack in the distance.
There was waves at Penrhyn Mawr, not huge & pretty messy & confused. This was the only shot I risked taking & doesn't really show the fun we had.
 We carry on to South Stack.


And hit a little problem, the tide was ripping around this headland & barring our passage to Abraham's Bosom. And I mean really ripping. Twice I tried heading straight into the flow about 10-15 metres from the shore, no chance. Then I change tact & hug dangerously close to the rocks with the swells breaking in, nearly made it this time but nearly took a beating on the rocks & lost my nerve.
I hate giving up so I paddled well out from shore & pushed against the ebbing tide. I was working hard, hard enough for sweat to be running down my face. It worked & I'd made it across (Phew).
Jen's still back in the other bay was holding his paddle in the air, he later told me it was to show me where he was though most paddlers know it as the 'come to me' signal. You got no chance (LOL). I hold my paddle aloft to encourage him along & he seemed to have an easier time of it than me???
 Lunch stop at Abraham's Bosom.
 I just love this place, beautiful!
Approaching closer to South Stack & getting nervous about the waves we're gonna encounter.
Not before a spot more rockhopping, this place is utterly fantastic with caves, rocks & gullies all over the place.
This shot taken just before pushing against the ebbing tide between the Island & main land. I recognized it from the rough water handling DVD I got & enjoyed practicing the techniques they displayed there.
Debating whether to paddle to North Stack or be brave & head out into the standing waves on the race?
It was a big spring tide & was at 100% flow when we got there, the waves looked huge.
We decided to be brave, though unfortunately there was not a chance in hell I was taking any pictures out there!
We played for a while on the waves then made our way back around the island & though the gully between the Island & mainland for another go.
We had a look at this cave on the Island first, composing ourselves I think.

Again no chance of taking pictures but I did take a couple in the relatively calm waters off the end of the Island as the tide squeezed around it.

Our adrenaline rush fulfilled we head back & take our time with plenty of rockhopping. This cave turned to the left further in & sounded like it went deeper than our eyes could see.

 Time to get more fluids & fuel in our aching bodies. Nice spot too.

More stunning scenery looking towards a dormant Penrhyn Mawr with the Lleyn Peninsular as a backdrop.

Cant believe what an awesome day that was !!!