Long and Hard Paddle.

Today was going to be a long technique paddle. Since this would be only my fifth paddle since November of last year, I thought practising technique would be a good thing.

When I was packing up the car to go to Deas Island, I knew from the wind and the rain, that this was going to be a hard one. When I got to the slough the rain had actually gotten heavier. So I quickly got on the water, for what I knew was going to be 2 hours of cold hard work. My motivation was that afterwards, I get to sit on the couch and drink coffee and watch the Masters.

The start of the paddle was ok, with the wind dying down a little. As I approached the marina on the way out to the islands, I checked my GPS, and it read 12.4 kph. I though hey this isn't so bad, good speed, medium hard, not bad.

As I got out into the main channel to Ladner, I noticed that the GPS was still quite high for the amount of effort I was putting in. Then it dawned on me, Idiot, the tide is going out, and you are going with the wind. No wonder I was going at that speed and barely paddling. It dawned on me that when I get to Westham Island, I was in for a major slog, all the way back to Deas.

It wasn't long before I got to Westham, and I could see the channel just churning, from the current and the wind in front of me. I came around the corner, and bam, it hit me. It blew me sideways, toward the straight. So I put the power on, and hammer to the Westham side of the channel, to get some (very little ) protection from the wind. I start grunting my way back toward Ladner, along side some of the biggest fishing boats I have ever seen.

As I was approaching the top of Westham, I decided to see just how long it would take the current and wind to send me backwards. So I stopped paddling, and looked at my watch. Less than 5 seconds and I was going backwards as fast, if not faster than I was going forwards.

I really had to go hard where the Ladner channel and the Westham channel meet. The water seems to swirl pretty good there, and there was no protection from the wind. After reaching the other side out of the wind. I stopped for a bite of a Cliff bar. Then it was off again into the current and wind. I cruised (if you could call it that) along side the floating homes. I thought to myself, boy I sure would like to live on one of these.

I got to the main channel that heads toward the Fraser, and turned toward Deas. I looked up and there was a canoe with two women just hammering toward me. They managed to slow down enough to say hi and off they went. They were sure fast. From here it was a slow paddle (still battling current and wind, which was now across my beam) back to Deas. At the end my GPS read: 17.68 kms.

Not bad for a wet, cold and windy Sunday.