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Subject:  Re: "You're goin' out in this snot!?!" |
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Author: Pathfinder |
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Date Posted: 22:12:05 06/29/05 Wed In reply to: Government 's message, "We made it to shore not the energy in our tattered bodies, but by the content of our character..." on 15:06:41 06/29/05 Wed Well, since you asked, here is a taste of what happened on day one, the rest is to follow in an expedition report. I don't want to take any of Government's thunder, but I'm sure he will post his thoughts too. Government was quite accurate, save the 60 mph winds, they were 70 mph, according to the fisherman. Also, the fisherman was no ordinary fisherman. He was a third generation commercial fisherman. The kind that has lived all his years on the Great Lakes. He is the kind that has had friends swallowed by the inland sea, the kind that has seen 35 foot waves on the lake. He knows everything about the sea and says little. He isn’t the type to waste words. That said, he was the one that warned us by saying, “You're goin' out in this snot, today?” I hadn’t had a good feeling about this trip all day, and he didn’t help, but he didn’t try to stop us either. Anyways, we launched just as the water calmed to a surreal, deadness. The black stillness you get only after a storm. Within minutes, the previous tail wind turned to a light head wind then began to pick up. We only had 6 miles to travel that day, but six miles on the open water can be a full day of exhausting work, and we were about to prove it. The wind was really nothing at first, we could clip along at about 3 mph. We took a heading straight to Summer Island while keeping our eye on the more distant Poverty Island. To our right was Little Summer Island. As we were within a mile of Summer Island, the water suddenly turned to knee deep and progress slowed to about 1.5 mph (according to the GPS). Vic and his “lifesaving” inflatable powerboat had to break his pursuit of us and travel a few miles around Summer Island and wait for us on Poverty. He was gone, and that would prove to be a bad thing. We stopped at Summer Island for a brief break. Then launched straight for the far corner of Poverty Island forever adrift in the churning expanse of open blue. Our route would take us a mile and a half from safe shore, but everyone was doing great. The winds were building to the forecasted 25 knots or 30 mph. Let’s stop here and see what these winds mean. According to the Beaufort Scale, We were in a Beaufort Force 7. Which means (according to the scale) near gale. Wind Speed 25-33 knots. Wave height 13 ½ - 19 feet (open ocean), sea state is described like this, “Sea heaps up; white foam from breaking waves begins to be blown in streaks” At first, it was fun. The kayaks would climb over the little four foot waves and then the bow would drop with a loud slap on the windward side. According to the GPS, our progress was still around 1-2 mph. But as the minutes clicked on, the wind began to roar and a few rouge 5-6 footers heaved and climbed in front of us. The happy little celebrations soon stopped and we began constantly checking on each other and we were still together and doing well. We attempted to raft, but one of the new expeditioners wasn’t paying attention and we broker apart, causing the rest to abandoned any attempt at another rest stop. So we pushed on, because pushing on was our only choice. The waves were building. We continued to paddle hard into the wind for an hour. Landmarks on the shore of Summer Island grew smaller but pasted painfully slow. I noticed a blue object on the shore that seemed to pass very little over the next hour. Our progress slowed to less than a mile per hour and some were showing signs of fatigue. Muskrat, who was the most experienced paddler, managed to catch my attention and yelled, “How do you think we’re doing?” “I wish we were on shore, but we’re doing alright”, I replied, knowing full well that if someone lost it, a rescue would be extremely dangerous if not impossible. I ignored her, but I knew full well her thoughts. No need to worry, yet. Then as if God decided to remind me of his power, a huge rouge came upon me. I looked almost straight up. I watched my hatch cover climb higher and higher. I dug my paddle in with everything I had. Just as I crested the wave, another rogue struck my Starboard bow. I whispered to myself, “Where the hell did that come from?!?”. The wave fully engaged my 16 foot kayak, which forces me to venture a guess that I had just climbed a 7-8 footer. I looked at my GPS and we were 1.36 miles to shore. Our speed was somewhere between .1-.5 mph. Looking back, that could have met forward or backward. Looking around, I saw scattered kayakers with tired strokes, a shore that didn’t come closer, and an angry sea that was acting strange. More rogues hit from different directions. Understand that waves from one direction are easy; you just handle them, routinely. But when they start hitting you (unexpectedly) from different directions, which is just freaky. As Muskrat and I paddled, Red Squirrel came between us and asked about taking a piss. Pretty strange request, maybe an attempt to get us to shore. I told him just to let it go. He mentioned that Government had a bottle. I interrupted him to say, “No, just let it go, we can clean it up later.” I looked at my GPS, still 1.36 miles to go, man this sucks. I notice Costello and Papa were talking. After about 5 minutes, Papa paddled up to me and said, “We’re going to have some dog tagged people today.” That was enough. After 4 hours, some of the crew (and therefore all of the crew) was at their end. Papa and I signaled to shore and everyone turned east and took the waves on the starboard beam. There was a weak protest from Government, but I think he understood the decision was final. But, it wasn’t over with yet. [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| Subject | Author | Date |
| Re: "You're goin' out in this snot!?!" | Lynne | 09:10:24 07/07/05 Thu |
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