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Syndication

Sea Kayaking Trip - Severn Estuary - Aug 2009 PDF Print E-mail
Trip Reports - Sea Kayaking Trips
Sunday, 03 January 2010 16:45

In August, I went on my first sea kayaking trip. I was looking forward to the expedition nature of it and to a good day's exercise, but what I wasn't expecting was the exhilarating nature of the paddle!

Sea kayaking on the Severn

As we were packing our boats, I learnt that due to the volume of these boats and being designed to be paddled fully loaded, sea kayakers do day trips in luxury! I clearly didn't have enough 'stuff'!

 

Wayne, Esther and I got in at Severn Beach, where it was a little tippy but the waves were steady and fairly predictable and I soon settled down into a rhythm. By the time we approached Denny Island, the waves had got a little larger and the water was moving quite fast. After paddling hard against the current (to find somewhere to land) and getting nowhere, Esther and I followed Wayne through some choppy stuff into the lee of the island, where all was calm. We got out onto the island, had our lunch and enjoyed the view.

All at sea.

Before leaving the island, I was given some instruction on how to ferryglide across the standing waves. Off we headed towards Portishead. Meanwhile, the wind had changed direction slightly and was now coming straight up the Bristol Channel.

Landed on a mudy beach.

This provided us with some fairly large swell - it was quite exciting surfing down some of the waves, but also a little scary cutting into/over them. But I was comforted by the appearance of Wayne right on my tail! Once a little closer to land, the swell died down and just a little more hard work was required to cross the tidal stream rushing round the headland before we could have a nice break on the mud - I mean beach!

From here to Clevedon was an 'easy' paddle, with just a headwind to challenge us. The final lesson of the day was that the jetty at Clevedon doesn't go all the way down to the sea at spring low water! After a few gruelling metres, I decided the best way to cross the mud is to slide with your weight on the kayak, running with your legs. It's efficient but quite messy!

Total distance = 10 + 3 + 7 = 20 kilometres.

Thanks to Wayne for an exhilarating day on the water/mud!

Check out all the photos by clicking here