Sink or Swim... it's a mini adventure

This is a pic of me looking particularly smug in my kayak, just on the north sea coast, off Hartlepool's Headland. My Parents home is in the background too, just to the left of the photo.


I don't have any photos of our latest er, adventure because the sea was a bit too rough for posing. Me and Mark did the usual, packed the car with the boats and headed to the coast. Hartlepool bay was like a mill pond, totally flat, so we decided to launch away from the bay and into a bit (understatement of the century!) of surf instead.


The road next to our launch site is part of the sea defense, so its quite a bit higher than the beach below. But the sea looked relatively flat, with just a few small waves to contend with. We got our gear unloaded and hauled it down to the beach, which was still getting covered by the falling tide.


I launched first, with a bit of help from mark, straight into the oncoming waves, which somehow seemed to become head height in the short time it took us to kit up. The paddle out past the surf turned into a mini adventure, and i really pushed Carolina (my boat) to the limit with quite a few waves breaking on us. It made me pretty confident that i could handle the sea's conditions that day (which would come back and bite me later in the day).




Mark eventually joined me past the surf line, and we headed off north towards Steetley pier. We had a rough ride to Steetley, with the wind and wave combo making the going tough. We called an end to the paddle out, and broke for a quick Mars bar, then turned round and headed back to our launch site. The plan was to have a gentle paddle back, then surf in on the very waves that made our launch so tough...


I picked my line to get back to the beach and was just about ready to go for it when a series of freak waves, probably about 3/4 times the size of all the others started building just in front of me. The set of freak waves had gone within a minute or so, i waited to see if they returned. They didn't so i made my way into my line. Seriously, i must have paddled about five strokes when this set of freak waves returned. I couldn't get away from them so i had to go with it, i managed to stay at the top of the first two and built up some speed. However, the third (and the largest), caught the stern of my boat and lifted it vertical, over my head, so in effect i was doing a cart wheel whilst still sitting in my kayak. The next bit was in slow motion, {remember the bit in the 'Indiana Jones' movie where that big boulder is gonna run over Harrison Ford, and the camera zooms out to show the full danger of the scenario?} well anyway, thats what it was like, i had time to see Mark getting wiped out in front of me, the beach some way ahead of me and just a chance glimpse of the sheer size of this wave.


...somewhere in this 'slow-motion', i made the decision to abandon ship! when i hit the water head first, everything started to run real time again. I landed in the water in front of my boat. The waves were battering the boat into my head so i ducked under water and came out the other side of her, i managed to collect my paddle and hold on to Carolina for dear life as the waves battered us both to the shore line. After what seemed like an age, my feet could touch sand so i could drag my boat and broken pride back to the beach just in time for the waves to die down completely, typical!


Now my boat is approx 14 foot long, so the wave that was to wipe me out must have been HUUUUGE!!!


...Lesson learned though, don't get cocky with the Sea, oh and always wear a wet suit cos the Sea is freezing!