April 26th - Discovery Island (#10)

I paddled out to Cadboro Point to join Dan and Paulo for a paddle around the Islands. We had a 10 knot ESE wind so the water was a little bit lumpy in places but not too bad. Not much current though there was a light ebb happening. You can see the outbound track was slower than the return due to wind and current. All the Steller Sea lions were on the farther out rock today - looked crowded! A huge one surface near me in the water in Rudlin bay and gave me the "eye"! It has been good to get out to the islands several time in the past week and a bit!

Bird list here: https://ebird.org/canada/checklist/S108153961

click to enlarge

15 km, YTD 138 km

April 23rd - Discovery Island (#9)

Dan and I went for an early morning paddle around the islands. We went the opposite way than we usually do, thinking that it would be better if the ebb built strongly - but it didn't! We had many Steller's sea lions at Seabird Point. Their noises are amazing! Conditions were great. No lumpy water!

Bird list here: https://ebird.org/canada/checklist/S107847970

click to enlarge

15 km, YTD 123 km

April 21st - Oak Bay Islands (#8)

I paddled over to Cattle point to join a group of 7 others (Alan, Dave, Bob, Elizabeth, John, Luc, and Tony) from the Thursday group that Alan organizes. It was a bit windy from the SE to start so it was a bit of a slog getting to Cattle point as well as a bit lumpy. By the time we had made it over to Flower Island, the winds had calmed and we went out to Cadboro Point to watch the very lumpy water formed as the current overfalls around the point and was meeting a swell from the Salish sea. The waves and "haystacks" were as big as I have seen in some time! We had lunch at Gonzales point and then paddled the shore past the Oak Bay Beach Hotel. A few guests at the pool waved at us and took pictures! :)

The birding was good with at least 16 species seen: https://ebird.org/canada/checklist/S107646761

click to enlarge

17 km, YTD 108 km

April 19th - Discovery Island (#7)

I paddled out to Cadboro Point to join Dan and Paulo for a morning paddle around the Islands. This was the longest paddle I have done in a while! :)

Conditions were good with a strong ebb throughout the morning and around 10 knots of SE wind. Great to get out around the islands again. There was a bit of lumpy water in the middle of Baynes channel. You can see how the current swept me to the SW for a bit in the middle of the channel and then I was able to paddle in a straight line! I also found it interesting that the back eddy near the "gap" between the islands gave me a significant push. I also tracked my route using my usual trusty Etrex HCx and my Columbus P1 gps logger and both gave very similar results! The P1 recorded a bit more often...

Bird list is here: https://ebird.org/canada/checklist/S107494468

click to enlarge

15 km, YTD 91 km

April 13 - Chatham Island (#6)

After returning from the Utah road trip I managed to get out for an afternoon paddle with Dan. The wind was quite strong (10-15 kt) in our face for the outward journey, but it calmed down for the return so we did not have its help on the return. It was great to get out on home waters again, though I was out of practice and out of shape!

click to enlarge

10 km, YTD 76 km

April 2nd - Colorado River (#5)

 I took the inflatable Blackfoot with us on our Utah road trip and managed to get it out once! I did a paddle down a stretch for the Colorado River from just below Moab to our campsite at Gold Bar (by the Corona Arch Trail). It was nice to have around a knot of current in my favour and it was great to get out on the water for a couple of hours. The river was not deep and I even ran aground at one point! Not a lot of birds seen, though I did see one great blue heron. I did get to see some of the petroglyphs we had seen from the road again from the river which was nice and it was cool to paddle down a part of this famous river (though I guess when I paddled on Lake Mead and Lake Powell I was on the same river!)

my track down the Colorado - click to enlarge

12 km, YTD 66 km