February 12, 2005

Returning to Winter

It had been two years since Joan had paddled in winter and three since she had paddled in winter with me. But with a new dry suit and an iffy forecast we headed out across Belmont Bay. Just the weekend before this bay was solid ice, but a warm week had caused the ice to vanish and we were happy to be paddling today.

The weather was supposed to turn nasty, with 30 MPH winds forecast for the afternoon. Since we launched at 11:00, it would not be long before it would be 'afternoon'.

As we crossed the channel a boat was busy dropping some sort of trap or crab pot directly in the channel. Prop bait I figured. After crossing the channel we decided we would paddle back in to Marumsco Creek and get out of the wind, which was blowing in from the south.

The waves felt 'old' to me. Only a foot high, they had a long wave length, as though they had formed long ago and were just now reaching us. Waves this small are usually 'bouncy', with a short period they are fun or irritating depending on my mood. But these had enough spacing between them to nearly lull me to sleep as we settled into the rhythm of timing our strokes to the beat of the waves.

Joan asked me if I remembered when these waves used to make her nervous. I did. It seems not that long ago they would have made me nervous too. But today they feel like an old friend - one I knew well.

The tide was running out of the creek as we paddled back as far as we could and turned around. I switched from gloves to to my NRS Toaster Mitts because my hands were chilly. The mitts are quite toasty and still leave enough dexterity you can still pick up a deck line or open a hatch cover.

The wind began to build as we left the creek. We paddled close to shore on our left. The signs all said national wildlife refuge, but I remember not to many years ago they had a different tone to them. My map shows it was a military reservation and the perimeter road looks like this was true at one point. We found a beach and walked back up the road to the porta-potty. A wooden marker with a piece of laminated plastic stapled to it showed us the map of this park.

We walked back to the kayaks and with the wind continuing to build and shift to the west we decided to paddle back across the bay to Mason Neck. After crossing the channel and in the full force of the wind I had Joan stop paddling so I could gage our drift as I tossed out a drift anchor. Joan continued to drift ahead while my pace dropped to a crawl. Since it was attached to my bow I expected it to quickly spin me around and face me into the wind but it didn't. Maybe it needed a longer rode...

I retrieved the drift anchor and caught up with Joan. The wind was pushing us along at a pretty good clip and it took no effort to get back to the park. I could tell Joan was reluctant to land but we both knew the weather was only going to get worse.

We landed and quickly loaded up as another kayaker landed. By the time we were ready to go our cars were rocking in the wind and we were happy to have made it back when we did.

Pictures