Kayaks

Post your true-blue Aussie yarns here.
Post Reply
User avatar
Stephen Whiteside
Posts: 3784
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2010 1:07 pm
Contact:

Kayaks

Post by Stephen Whiteside » Sat Dec 03, 2011 9:57 am

Kayaks

© Stephen Whiteside 03.12.2011

There is something very elemental about a kayak. It’s about as simple as water travel can get. A paddle. A lightweight, stream-lined craft sitting as low as would seem possible in the water. I suppose you might have a small sail to assist if the wind is favourable. And that’s about it. Perhaps a foot-controlled rudder. No noisy engines. No fumes. No centre board or propellor to snag on the ocean floor.

You can go anywhere in a kayak. Just about. I’ve crashed through two foot waves in a kayak, and drifted over still water less than a foot deep. I’ve paddled through a thunderstorm (not that I’d recommend it). I’ve danced around jagged reefs and ghosted over long sandy spits. These are places I could not have accessed any other way. No other watercraft could take me there, and I could not get there by land.

Kayak labour is honest labour, too. It’s all sweat and grunt. No cheating. Sure, waves, tide, current and wind might come to your assistance. But they might just as likely work against you too. I never feel guilty receiving benefits such as these, knowing that the wheel is likely to turn again very soon.

The silence is one of the most appealing aspects of kayaking. Your paddles make a noise as they enter the water, of course. But not much. And it’s a nice sound. I like it. Stop paddling, of course, and you will hear the water dripping off the paddles onto the deck, or your sleeves. You will hear your kayak silently swishing through the water. Then the dripping stops, and the swishing stops, and the kayak makes no noise at all.

So what do you hear then? It depends, doesn’t it. You might hear a dog bark on the beach. A sea-gull screech overhead. The splash of a leaping fish.

You might hear the blow of a dolphin or whale. The whack of the pectoral fin of a nearby humpback whale as it strikes the surface of the water. The almighty crash of a chunk of ice as it breaks off a glacier.

Some of these things I have heard myself, and some I have not. And of those I have I have never heard, there are some I will hopefully hear some day, and others I will never hear. And some I will only hear on YouTube videos. For example, I’ve never heard a dog barking on the beach. Only joking.

Why go kayaking at all when you can close the door, turn off the light, and watch kayaking videos on YouTube forever?

I used to be afraid of being attacked by a shark while in a kayak. It’s an irrational fear, I know, but it has never left me. I don’t even go fishing in kayaks. And frightened, dying fish attract sharks in a way that silent, sterile, yellow plastic kayaks do not.

Fishing in a kayak? Why bother? It would spoil all the fun. First there’s the idea of killing all those fish, when it’s so much more fun to ‘leave no footprints’, as they say. Yes, I know, I like to eat fish, and I prefer somebody else to do my killing, and it’s hypocritical. I understand that. But surely even fishermen like to take time off from all that killing sometimes? Just smell the roses. Or the oceanic equivalent. (I don’t think it’s kelp.)

Then there’s the question of having all those dead fish to worry about. You can’t keep them out of the water for too long or they’ll start to rot, especially if it’s a nice day. So there’s a pressure to go home.

But then there’s the whole distraction thing. How can you concentrate on the wind in your hair and the sun in your face and the sparking water and the surging waves and the screeching birds and the flapping seals (maybe) when you’ve got these fishing lines trailing out of the back of your kayak which could snap taut at any moment and demand your complete attention? No, it’s a mug’s game, kayak fishing. Unless you like it, of course. Which I don’t.

But back to sharks. Why would a shark attack a kayak? I’ve heard of people in wet-suits lying on boogie boards being attacked by sharks. Apparently they look a bit like weird seals from below. I get that. And the splashing, tinkling sound of their hands and feet in the water can sound a bit like seals.

But a kayak? It couldn’t look - or smell - appealing, surely. Could the shark focus on the person in the kayak rather than the kayak itself? But, from a shark’s perspective, they wouldn’t be aware of the person, surely. And sharks don’t like eating people, anyway. They’re too bony.

I’ve heard that sharks have sensory organs in their skin, and sometimes ‘bump’ things to find out more about them. Even a bump from a curious shark would freak me out, and maybe it could even tip the kayak over. But why would a shark even bother to bump a kayak? I can’t see how it would even become interested in the first place. So, no, I don’t think there’s any rational reason to be afraid of sharks. Unfortunately, though, there are still plenty of IRRATIONAL reasons.

I saw a video recently of some killer whales taking a scary amount of interest in a kayak, circling it from below, over and over. But the kayak had a black bottom. It could have looked a lot like a seal. I don’t think I’d ever paddle a kayak with a black bottom. Also, this particular kayak was unusually short and broad, and seal-like. I’d like a kayak that was long and narrow and brightly coloured, thank you very much.

People do crazy things in kayaks. I saw some people in a film kayaking around some island near Scandinavia or the Arctic Circle. They were getting too much turbulence from the backwash off the cliffs, so they headed out to sea where the swell was less disturbed. I think they even lost sight of the island for a while. What courage does that take? Or madness? Perhaps it comes with experience.

I’d love to kayak across Bass Strait one day. It sounds crazy, I know, but people seem to do it quite often. Not alone, of course, in a group. And not all in one go. They island hop, sleeping on an island each night. It takes about a week to ten days, I think. And you need to pick your weather, of course. But wouldn’t it be awesome?

There’s a wonderful sense of well being that descends upon you when you are kayaking. Not always, of course, but often. And the longer you paddle, and the more remote the waters, the better it gets.

I’d love to learn to roll. I don’t think you can really call yourself a proper kayaker until you’ve learnt to roll confidently. If a big wave throws you over, you have to be able to right yourself again. Without that ability, it seems to me it is just a matter of time before you strike big trouble - if you’re tackling the open ocean, that is. I guess for lakes and rivers and small bays it doesn’t matter so much.

Of course, they’re pretty expensive, modern kayaks. You could easily spend several thousand dollars on a brand new fibreglass sea kayak. The Greenlanders made them out of seal or walrus skins stretched over a light timber frame. And the Pacific Islanders made canoes out of hollowed logs, didn’t they. And the Aborigines fashioned canoes out of pieces of bark.


It was the Greenlanders that fashioned the prototypes for the modern kayak, wasn’t it. Them and the Inuit, I guess. The closed deck and cockpit with skirt, all designed to keep the water out. I guess it didn’t matter so much for the Canadian Indians, where the water was not as cold, so they developed their more open style canoes.

But it’s the kayaks I love. They’re so sleek and stream-lined. You feel you can go anywhere, tackle anything, in a kayak.
Stephen Whiteside, Australian Poet and Writer
http://www.stephenwhiteside.com.au

Neville Briggs
Posts: 6946
Joined: Sun Oct 31, 2010 12:08 pm
Location: Here

Re: Kayaks

Post by Neville Briggs » Sat Dec 03, 2011 1:39 pm

That's a very interesting meditation Stephen. I thought after reading it, how we have one of the longest coastlines in the world and most of our population likes to live near the sea, but our folk ( bush ) poetry seems to have little to say about the ocean or the sea shore.
hmmmm.

In the shark's domain, I guess we are powerless ; unless we are supported by a fairly large mechanical system. So while the seemingly ruthless predatory shark has the upper hand we will remain fearful I s'pose.


I can't use a kayak, it would be too much like a walrus trying to ride in the Innuit's boat :lol: maybe I would do better on the local river in a coracle.
Neville
" Prose is description, poetry is presence " Les Murray.

william williams

Re: Kayaks

Post by william williams » Sat Dec 03, 2011 3:34 pm

Hi Stephen I hope you know what you are letting your self into from Cape Otoway to King Island 85 miles of open water in a cray boat 45ft in length traveling speed 9 knotts time to do the trip 15 hours .

from Flinders to Currie longer distance first step Flinders to Appollo Bay 80 miles 13 hours Appollo
bay to Currie 17 hours. how many hours can your arms keep going and can you keep up 9knots an hour and sleep, wind, tide, and waves cost of an escort boat 45 to 60 ft long back up staff. Doctors may make a quid but that trip would not be cheep. but around the land scenery is great both K I or main land Victoria Western port bay, Curio Bay, Phillip Island think of those areas. Good luck mate and enjoy your self

Bill Williams the old Battler

User avatar
Stephen Whiteside
Posts: 3784
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2010 1:07 pm
Contact:

Re: Kayaks

Post by Stephen Whiteside » Sat Dec 03, 2011 4:31 pm

Neville, I read that great white sharks are scared of killer whales. The orcas have stumbled onto an old trick, apparently. If you turn a shark upside down it sort of hypnotises it. It becomes paralysed. There have been a couple of instances like this observed. On one particular occasion, there were 100 great whites in one small area feeding on seals. One shark was smashed in the side by a killer whale, caught completely off guard. The whale held it upside for about fifteen minutes until it had drowned. Then it ate its liver. Within a matter of minutes, all the other sharks in the area had vanished. Fortuitously, one had a satellite tag. It dived to some extraordinary depth, then turned up one week later in Hawaii, about 3,000 km away! It's nice to know that great whites can get as scared as anybody else! Interestingly, too, killer whales almost never attack humans. (I'm talking wild orcas here. Captive orcas are an entirely different kettle of fish.) My enemy's enemy is my friend!

William, relax. I'm not about to set off tomorrow, or even next week. If I did do it, though, I think I'd be inclined to go the other way - down to Flinders Island. There are more small islands on the east side of the strait. Probably no more than 50 km between any of them - still a decent day's paddle, as you say.
Stephen Whiteside, Australian Poet and Writer
http://www.stephenwhiteside.com.au

User avatar
Stephen Whiteside
Posts: 3784
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2010 1:07 pm
Contact:

Re: Kayaks

Post by Stephen Whiteside » Sat Dec 03, 2011 4:36 pm

Stephen Whiteside, Australian Poet and Writer
http://www.stephenwhiteside.com.au

william williams

Re: Kayaks

Post by william williams » Mon Dec 05, 2011 8:59 am

very good mate around the Flinders island group fantastic mutton birds are great but lousy with tiger snakes and nearly 100miles from Phillip island to the flinders island group with no land inbetween

bill williams

User avatar
Stephen Whiteside
Posts: 3784
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2010 1:07 pm
Contact:

Re: Kayaks

Post by Stephen Whiteside » Mon Dec 05, 2011 3:57 pm

Actually, that's not true, Bill. You didn't read those links, did you!

From Wilson's Prom to Hogan Island is about 50km, from there to Erith Island is another 50 km, and from there to Flinders Island is about 60 km. The kayakers seem to travel at about 7 km/hr. They leave early - about 5 am every morning - and usually reach their destination around 2 - 4 pm. Admittedly, they're probably younger and fitter than me, but it is definitely do-able, and many have done so.
Stephen Whiteside, Australian Poet and Writer
http://www.stephenwhiteside.com.au

william williams

Re: Kayaks

Post by william williams » Mon Dec 05, 2011 4:48 pm

sorry mate did not take much notices from Wilsons Promentory I have mainly alway gone from Flinders(west head) to Currie (king Island) or to Flinders Group crays were our target and dam good tucker to
mind you that was 57 years ago and sea crafts have changed a lot since then
bill williams

User avatar
Stephen Whiteside
Posts: 3784
Joined: Sat Nov 27, 2010 1:07 pm
Contact:

Re: Kayaks

Post by Stephen Whiteside » Mon Dec 05, 2011 8:12 pm

Oh well, you've obviously been around. It's very interesting, though. There are a number of parties now that have made the crossing over the years. Many of them have posted very detailed reports of their journeys. They make fascinating reading. I'm sure all of these people are very experienced paddlers. They have probably built up to a journey like that over a number of years. If I ever tackled it I would do the same, and I probably never will, but it doesn't cost anything to dream.
Stephen Whiteside, Australian Poet and Writer
http://www.stephenwhiteside.com.au

Post Reply