July 20th - Discovery (#51)

Dan, Paulo and I went for a morning paddle out around Chatham and Discovery. There was a strong ebb building which helped carry us back from Discovery and a good wind that slowed our progress down the east and south sides of Discovery. It was great to be back out in my usual stomping grounds! The tide was pretty low.

15 km, YTD 663 km

July 18 - South of Lima (#50)

Jenny and I went for a guided trip with Alvaro Ali of Peru Sea Kayaking. Alvaro has real sea kayaks which were a nice change from the boats I had paddled on the previous two trips. We drove from our B&B in Barranco, Lima south to a summer holiday community of Santa Maria were we launched the kayaks. We paddled south along some spectacular cliffs to a neat little islet with a magnificent surge channel. Might have been fun in a plastic single! Afer that we made our way back to a small protected bay for lunch and a rest.
There was a fairly good southerly swell and probably 5-10 knots of wind throughout that made the sea conditions a bit more interesting. Again you can see from the track image how desolate the desert is adjacent to the rich ocean. Alvaro organised a good tour and had good equipment which was a nice change! The same evening we started our long trek back to Canada!

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11 km, YTD 648 km

July 16 - Paracas (#49)

After visiting the amazing Ballestas Islands and the spectacular Paracas National Reserve, we had a free morning, so I rented a sit on top Hobie kayak from the nearby Hilton resort. The kayak was an absolute tub, but at least I was out on the water amongst pelicans, boobies, terns, cormorants and skimmers! There were small fish jumping all over, testifying to the richness of the local waters. I paddled from the resort to the point by the town, pausing for a brief visit with Jenny who was taking it easy that morning in our hotel. I would love to paddle this area more extensively in a real sea kayak... You can see from the track image how dry the surrounding desert is - not a plant to be seen! You can also see from the track how slow the Hobie SOT tub was to paddle!

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6 km, YTD 637 km

July 10 - Lake Titicaca (#48)

Jenny and I paddled out in a double from Puno to the Uros floating Islands in Lake Titicaca. It was pretty cool to be paddling at 3850 m (over 12500 ft!) and gorgeous conditions. We paddled out through the reeds, seeing lots of water birds (and a fair bit of garbage!) and reached the Uros floating Islands village (clearly visible in the track). This community is made up of about 40 islands made from floating totora reeds. It was pretty neat to see, though a bit touristy. After this we joined a regular group to go out to Amantani and Taquile Islands for an overnight.

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5 km, YTD 631 km

June 30th - Discovery Island (#47)

I paddled out to Maynard Cove to meet up with Dan and Gordin, and we then proceeded around Chatham and Discovery Islands. The weather was superb! Sunshine and calm, but not too hot. There were also minimal currents, so no hard work! It was good to paddle again with Gordin as I have not done so in a while.We saw quite a few paddlers while out there including the Discovery Shuttle group.

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16 km, YTD 626 km

Cedar to Campbell river overview

Here is an overview map of my Cedar to Campbell River trip which included three of the longest days kayaking I have done!

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Accoding to my GPS, the max speed attained while sailing was 18.7 kph, and during the three long days, we spend 24hours and 35 mins on the water! Average speed was 6.5 kph which is not bad for a fully loaded boat. At roughly 60 strokes a minute, that could work out to be almost 90,000 paddle strokes!
Total trip: 172 km, YTD 610 km.

June 28 - Sandy Island to Campbell River (#46)

Tom split off from Alan and I and went to get picked up in Comox, while Alan and I decided to push our way to Campbell River.  Conditions were quite calm, and there was a light drizzle/rain all day. Today we actually paddled all day except for a short sail for the last km or so. We finished off at the Ken Ford boat ramp, so I guess that is were I need to start my last leg of my around the island trip (Campbell River R to Port Hardy)! We stopped at Kitty Coleman for a lunch break and were met by Monica and Chris in Campbell River at 6 PM. A shower and a pub dinner were much appreciated after three days of rainy and windy weather. However, the SE winds associated with the crummy weather  is what enabled us to cover in 3 days what we had planned for 4 and a half!

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49 km, YTD 610 km

June 27th - French Creek to Sandy Island (#45)

This was a serious sailing day. We made good progress with a steady SE wind behind us (Chrome Island was blowing at 22-24 knots during that time!). We ducked into Deep Bay for a break and fish and chips and then continued on in strong tailwinds to Sandy Island. Sandy is a beautiful spot and the winds died down and the rain did too! PS Denman is quite a long island!

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55 km, YTD 561 km

June 26th - Flat Tpos to French Creek (#44)

This was the first "real day" of our trip and it ended up being a long one. Though it was overcast and drizzly off and on all day, the wind was behind us and we made good use of our Pacific Action Sails. I think this is the most I have ever covered in a day of kayaking! French creek was a safe but not very convenient take out, since the campground was a few hundred metres from the marina. However, dinner at the pub was a bonus. Definitely a bit wet and tired this day. (oh and my air mattress had a slow leak...). You can see that our pace was pretty good all day thanks to a tail wind.

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56 km, YTD 506 km

June 25th - Cedar to Flat Tops (#43)

I paddled from Cedar Boat Launch out to meet up with Alan and Tom to start another leg of my around the Island in bits trips. Unfortunately, it was pouring rain when I was packing the boat at the Cedar boat launch which made for a miserable start!. By the time I had made it to Flat tops, the rain had stopped, and it became a nice evening. I had hoped to take a short cut, but the tide was too low, and I had to detour to the next gap to the south. Fortunately it was not that much of a detour! Gabriola pass had a nice flood which gave me a bit of a push.

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12 km, YTD 450 km

June 23rd - Oak Bay (#42)

I paddled over to Willows beach to meet up with a SISKA group led by Sheila. Dave and I were the naturalists and had a good time sharing our love and knowledge of the marine environment. I think we covered under 2 km as we paddled around looking at things just below the surface. You can see my speed to and from Oak Bay was a bit faster! In spite of it being a grey day, the rain held off, and the wind was not too strong.

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10 km, YTD 438 km

June 16th - Harbourfest (#41)

I went down to the harbourfest in the afternoon to do a short demonstration of Greenland rolling. I did not get any distance in and didn't use my GPS! :) There were about 50 people watching and I had fun doing some rolls I have not done for a while.I also got to throw the spear that Bill made for me!

Douglas Bain took some great shots (including some showing poor form!) which are posted here: http://bluegiraffephoto.zenfolio.com/harbour/h6e2ff07a#h6a298d5b

what is he looking at!

0 km, YTD 428 km

June 15th - Discovery Island (#40)

Dan, Paulo and I went for a morning paddle around Chatham and  Discovery islands. On our way past Flower Island we saw a dead head log poking a few inches out of the water. I called it in to Victoria Coastguard Radio as we had no marking equipment with us. It was vertical and solid - would cause significant damage to anything that hit it! We then made our way over to the bay by Heritage point to practice some rolling. I am doing a demonstration tomorrow in the harbour and needed to check that I could still do them all! After a good rolling session, we paddled on around Discovery, stopping to chat with the folks on the ORS Discovery Shuttle tour. After paddling around to boathouse bay, we met Bob, Ken and Alfonse coming in the opposite direction. We noticed at least two sets of campers in the wrong locations on Discovery Island! We made our way around the top end of Chatham Island and back over to Cadboro Bay. We checked on the dead head (14 km mark), and it was in the same location. Hopefully someone can get a marker on it sometime.

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15 km, YTD 428 km

June 13th - Cadboro Bay (#39)

Peter and I went for a short afternoon paddle in Cadboro Bay so that he could test drive the Tahe Greenland T. Conditions were great, and we had a nice paddle. Peter left with a nice new Tahe on his roof as well as a Northern Light Greenland paddle!

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4 km, YTD 413 km

June 11th - Cadboro Bay (#38)

This evening I led a group of 18 SISKA paddlers on a relaxed tour of Cadboro bay. The tide was high so we were able to poke around in lots of bays. Conditions were nice, and I had a great support crew of Mark and Gary as sweeps and Debbie as the pace setter!

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7 km, YTD 409 km