2013: Post 31b – New World Island - Day Two

See 'Post 31a' for Day One...

I had another restless sleep; it generally takes me two or three nights before I can sleep well when out camping.  I woke to the pretty sound of a bird calling... tweet, tweet.... a pause then tweet, tweet, tweet.  It repeated this over and over.  I dug out my watch from my drybag.  It was a little after four am.  I closed my eyes and tried to go back to sleep.  That darn bird just would not shut up!  It was very nice to hear but I had not slept well the last two nights and it started getting to me.  After a while I checked the time again - almost 5 am.  Just as well to get up.  I rolled up my thermarest pad and stuffed my sleeping bag into the drybag.  Then I took down my tent and carried it all down to my kayak.  

I was the only one up and had this view all to myself for a little while...

It wasn't long and the guys came to life.  We had breakfast, packed up, and were on the water before 8 am.

Tony, Hazen, and Neville

Brian

Tony

Our route took us to Pikes Arm where we crossed under the bridge..

We crossed over to Ship Island, through Gut Arm, and then through Gut Tickle...

Hazen

Neville

We pulled up on one of the islands for a break before crossing over to Little Harbour Bight.  The original plan was to camp in Little Harbour but the forecast for the next day was calling for a stiff northeast wind.  So we had decided then to have lunch in Codjack Cove and would carry on to get around Devil's Cove Head so we would be in the lee of next day's forecasted wind.

Lunch beach in Codjack Cove

With stomach's refueled we carried on up around Clam Rock Point, Spillers Point, and then French Head.  Then we paddled across Burnt Island Tickle and landed on a beach before Handkerchief Cove Head (on Burnt Island) where we took a little break.  Then we crossed over to Horney Head and made our way along the shore to Devils Cove Head.  Some pics along the way....

Brian

Tourists out for a ride

Devils Cove Head where we stood a couple days before

Tony

Just another kilometer or so and we pulled into Sleepy Cove where we would camp for the second night.  This was supposed to be the camp spot for night three.  So we were now a full day ahead of schedule.

Tony

Hazen

Funny story...  After all five of us pitched our tents on the beach Hazen brought up the question of how high the tide might come up the beach.  So Tony checked the charts he had and there would be about another 1.2 metres above where it was at the time.   We sized it up and decided to be safe and carried our tents up to the grassy spot higher up.

It was a good decision. Hazen had his tent right in the spot in the picture below where the pool of water is and so would have received the worst of it, but we would all have had our tents wet!!!  

Hazen knew that Grant Cudmore (one of our paddle club's central reps) was in the area and so he called him and he brought some cold beer to our camp site for us.  Now that was a very well appreciated treat!!  

There wasn't a lot of wood around but we managed to scrounge up enough to have a nice little fire to go along with a couple drinks... 

I was tired when I crawled into my tent....

(See Tony's blog entry for morning and the afternoon of Day Two)