The Ups and Downs of Sea Kayaking

One of the joys of sea kayaking is to paddle in many different locations, but even paddling back and forth in the same area offers lots of variation and interest. These two pictures were taken 'somewhere on Trinity Bay', Newfoundland, on a day when Alison Dyer and I paddled I along a coastline she's paddled often and knows well. While her kids, husband and their friends walked the trail along the coast heading to a picnic beach, we got to enjoy a rollicking downwind paddle along the cliff face. The waves were good and bouncy, the birds in full scream, the whales just visible now and then and best of all, the wind was at our back. We surfed along at times and at others, we played in the rock gardens, squeezing through narrow slits and channels, taking advantage of the swell to get through. It was a fun outing on a warm, sunny, breezy day.


At the end of the ride and after the picnic, we had the option of borrowing a car to shuttle our boats back home, or to paddle over the same route we'd just come, albeit, this time, upwind. We didn't need to discuss it. We'd had so much fun coming downwind, going back up was bound to please as well. And it did. So even paddling back up the coast we'd just past was fun, challenging and completely worth the effort. It wasn't boring or plagued with a sense of 'sameness'. It seemed completely new and exhilerating. The joy of kayaking!