January 1, 2002

New Year - 2002

Another New Year, and the beginning of my fourth season. And like the previous three, this tradition of mine of going for a New Year's paddle is different than each of the previous years.

It is unusually calm this morning and quickly throwing my gear in the car and lashing down the K1 has me excited that I will keep the tradition alive. As I back out of the driveway I check my scouting notes for directions. I can't read Kanji, so my directions are by traffic lights. "Go to the first light, turn Left. Go down 2 lights and turn left again. Go to first light and turn left, then follow the blue signs to the auto camper park."

This is how my first kayaking trip in Misawa Japan begins. As I get closer to Lake Ogawara I am more and more confident I will finally be back in my kayak after several months of anticipation. But as I pull in and can see the water, I see ice. Lots of ice.

I'm crushed. I had noted to myself just a few days before how the water had been totally ice free. But now the ice appears to extend a good 150 feet from shore.

There doesn't appear to be a parking lot. If there is, it is buried under the snow. So I park along the road, next to a "no parking" sign.

Beneath the sign is an arrow pointing to both sides of the road, and below that, if I interpreted the sign correctly, is "July 18 - Aug 31, 9:00 am - 6:00 pm"

My assumption, right or wrong, is that it is ok to park there. I get out and make my way across the snow to the beach. The first three feet is a thick pack ice, and I slowly make my way out onto it to survey the thinner ice beyond. I made up my mind that the trip would not happen, and picked up a small chunk of ice and tossed it out onto the ice. It landed with a splash, and I realized the snow was masking what I was seeing and that the ice was thin. I could make it out!

After unloading the boat off the car and stowing the gear, I pulled the kayak across the snow down to the beach and on to the ice shelf. I stepped into water about shin deep and could hear the thin ice cracking all around.

Pulling the kayak off the shelf increased the amount of cracking around me in the water, and I straddled the kayak and got in.

The sprayskirt went on quickly, and I turned to head out towards open water. It had began to snow as I packed the kayak and now it was getting heavy enough I could not see the far shore about a mile away. I paddled gently through the slush and skim ice until I reached the outer edges, where I could see a pod of birds several hundred yards further off shore. I swung towards them to get a closer look, but they soon took flight. They don't know me well enough yet to trust me.

I turned north. I won't go far. Maybe a mile or two. With the snow coming down harder, and there being a little doubt about if I'm legally parked or not, I stay close to shore. At least as close as the ice will let me. I paddle along the edges of some large floes, the edges being kept a broken mosaic by the small wavelets. Twenty feet into the ice the water is completely flat.

Along the shore there are houses. Some small, some large, some that look more like a shed. None of them real close together. The swans, honk loudly at me before taking flight. They too didn't wait for me to get close.

To the west is the windward shore, and now with the snow slowing, appears about half of a mile away. I'll paddle a little further, but when the far shore disappears from view, I know the snow is getting heavy so I reluctantly lean hard to turn the boat around. A quarter way across my deck now the snow is gone where the water washed it away during my turn. It feels good to control the boat this way.

Heading south, I notice a few cars go by with faces plastered against the side windows. I'm sure I'm a sight in my bright yellow boat with my dry suit poking through the middle. I'm back to the launch too soon. But the ice has all moved except for the ice shelf on the shore. I park against the shelf and climb out and onto the ice, grabbing the painter as I go. I toss the painter across my shoulder and haul the kayak out first onto the ice, and then onto the snow. It slides easily up the beach back to the car.

And so ends the story of my first paddle of 2002. The beginning of my fourth season. The beginning of two years in Japan. The first trip report of many. But the ice has me convinced it may be spring before I paddle again on this lake.

Omedeto! Happy New Years!

Woody