Sunday 5 February 2012

Rich goes 'Into the wind'


19th Jan – Foel to Llanddwyn and back via Caernarfon

Another trip planned, this time to ride the tide from Caernarfon to Llanddwyn and back. Force 4 westerlies were forecast for most of the day. I decided to start from Foel to avoid driving to Caernarfon, and as Roger had an optician appointment there, I had time to kill at the start of the day. 

Setting off from Foel


Setting off from Foel I noticed that a large amount of the sandbanks were visible so had to pick my line through them quite carefully as a walk is on the cards if the wrong line is taken. My line was good apart from a brief stint of paddling in water no more than about 30cm deep. Once over the strait I headed past Caernarfon towards Coed Helen to the meeting point where Roger had just arrived and was busy unloading his boat and kit. Just as Kev arrived, the weather took a turn and we were forced to seek shelter in Roger’s van whilst the shower passed. The photo below was taken just before the shower hit!

Rainbow on the Menai Strait

 We got on the water to catch the last of the ebb out of the strait towards Abermenai Point and Fort Belan. For the whole of this section of the trip we were subjected to Force 4 or 5 winds more or less on the nose and over the tide which made for some very lumpy conditions. It appears that a low-volume, Greenland-style kayak didn’t like these conditions very much. I spent the majority of the time rebuilding my speed back up, having lost it all every time I was sent crashing off the back of a wave. It was tiring work, but we still made steady progress averaging between 6km/h and 8km/h. 

Rough conditions start here


Once round the corner, passing Abermenai Point and Fort Belan on the way, we then caught sight of our destination, Llanddwyn Island. 

Approaching Fort Belan


Our destination - Llanddwyn


Sun was poking through the clouds, but we were now heading directly into the wind which slowed our progress down a bit. Once the flood had started we were back into wind over tide conditions again. It was made worse by the numerous sandbanks and channels that exist off Newborough Beach, some of the waves reaching well over a metre in height.  Our progress was now quite slow, with the choppy conditions and wind limiting our speed to about 5km/h. 

It felt like a fairly long crossing to Llanddwyn in the end, and we had a bit of excitement on our final approach to Pilot’s Cove, where fairly big surf was forming. Kev gave me one of the funniest sights I’ve seen, pulling a hilarious face whilst bursting through the back of a wave. Once into the calm waters of the cove, we landed and dragged our boat up towards the wall where we stopped to have a well-deserved break. We’d paddled 12km in just over 2 hours into the wind, tide assistance being our only help. 

Once we’d dispatched our coffee and food, as well as waving like lunatics to a group of ramblers by the lighthouse, we got back in our boats to begin the return journey. We paddled in a north-westerly direction out of the cove taking advantage of some surf for a few minutes of fun. The swell had grown considerably by now, and with the wind now gusting F6 we were paddling in a fairly challenging, quartering sea once we’d stopped surfing and were heading back to Caernarfon. 

It was imperative to keep paddling as each wave came and maintaining a sensible direction was very difficult. The conditions were up there with probably the toughest I’d faced. A few minutes later Kev was capsized by a large wave and only narrowly missed out on a roll. A wet exit ensued as neither me or Rog were able to get along-side him quickly in the swell. Once Kev was back in his boat (and we’d retrieved his perpetually-floating sunglasses case [it’s another story – ask Kev]) and paddling away again we were making good progress, paddling in excess of 7km/h downwind against the tide. 

However, our progress was halted by Kev being capsized again by a large wave as we crossed some of the shallower water opposite the Newborough Beach car park. This time, Rog managed to get alongside him quickly to Eskimo-rescue (whether Kev wanted to roll or not!) and got him upright again fairly quickly. We then carried on making steady progress towards Abermenai Point, and once within about a kilometre of the point entered some relatively calmer waters. 

Calmer water


This made the final bit of paddling into the strait somewhat easier, but offshore we could see that the Caernarfon Bar sandbank was taking a real pounding by the waves. Once into the strait, the conditions calmed further, and we were now in a following sea, with tide and wind working with us. We made excellent progress towards Caernarfon, surfing small waves and reaching speeds of 15km/h. We were glad of some assistance from both wind and tide for the first time in the day. 

Once back in Caernarfon, I said my goodbyes to Rog and Kev and proceeded to ferry-glide back across the strait towards Foel, once again negotiating some very shallow water. The tide was running pretty quickly now, so I had to adjust my bearing on the final stretch to accommodate this, making back to the car in just over an hour and a half since leaving Llanddwyn. I was exhausted by the time I reached the car and once I’d changed, had to sit down for a few minutes before loading the boat onto the roof. 

24km paddled in rough conditions in just under 4 hours. I slept well that night!

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