2016: Post 25 – Slow paddlin', tardiness, and onion rings

Since we did our overnight kayak camping trip  on the 1st and 2nd of October it has been windy on weekends, and so I've been getting in some hiking trips instead.  I've managed six day hikes in October!

This past weekend the forecast was calling for more wind but there was a lull for Saturday morning.  Tony and I met at St. Philips before 9 am with hopes to get in a short morning paddle before the wind picked up after lunch.  Cathy and Gary said they would be there but they hadn't showed up. We decided they must have changed their minds and so we headed out of the marina and turned our bows toward Topsail Beach.  

Tony at Wester Point

There was little wind but a bit of swell that made things a little fun along the way.

We weren't in any particular hurry and were just sort of poking our way along.  We were a few kilometers down the shore and happened to look behind us and there was Cathy, clipping right along.  She said she had pulled into the parking lot just as we were rounding Wester Point.  She quickly geared up and picked up her pace to catch up to us.

Tony and I have done a lot of paddling in the past with just the two of us, but we prefer to have company...  besides, three kayakers are far better and safer then just two...  

The three of carried on towards Topsail Beach...

When we got to Topsail Beach we kept on going another kilometer or so along the beach before finally stopping.  We rafted up and chatted for a while and then decided it was time head back.

Cathy passing through the outfall from Topsail Bight

We took our time paddling back to St. Philips.  Once there we rinsed off in the fresh water of Broad Cove River and then headed to the nearby restaurant for coffee and conversation.  Cathy also treated us to a big basket of very good-tasting onion rings...  yep, we sure were glad she showed up for the paddle...

2016: Post 24 – Back to Bull Arm

On the first weekend of September (see previous post) some of us spent a night in Bull Arm.  Tony was busy with house repairs and would not take the time off to do the trip. 

This past weekend (Oct 1 and 2) Tony suggested a night in Bull Arm so he could go have a look at the Hebron GBS in Mosquito Cove....

Tony had not been on the water much lately due to house
repairs and was the first one on the water at Chance Cove... 

Gary

Derek

We did not have far to paddle to the proposed camp site near Masters Head.  I was going to suggest we carry on up to Stock Cove to camp (where Clyde, Derek, Shane, and I had camped in September) but decided to not try to change Tony's plan.

The camp site

When we got to the campsite we pitched our tents and then it was time to have some lunch.  Cathy had recently obtained her Level 2 Sea kayaking certification and I had e-mailed her before the trip and teased her about how it would be good expedition behavior for her to feed me on this trip... just so she could have the practice.  Well, she took me up on it and made me a couple wraps for my lunch.  They were so good and I was so happy to allow her to practice her new skills...

After lunch Tony, Cathy, and Hazen got into their kayaks and paddled up to Mosquito Cove.  
Gary, Derek, and I had decided to stay at the camp site.  It was such a beautiful day and at this time of year the evenings are short and if we paddled up to Mosquito Cove I knew it would be supper time before we got back to camp.  Nope.. wasn't gonna do it.... I decided to just relax and enjoy the day in the sunshine.  I told Cathy we would collect up some wood for the evening fire and keep an eye on things while they were gone.

We fully enjoyed the afternoon. The first order of business was to relax and have a beer...

Gary

Derek

After a while Derek and I  got our saws and work gloves and proceeded to collect up some wood for the evening fire.  Gary decided he would lay down in the grass and take a nap.

There was very little wood on the beach and so Derek and I took to the woods.  There was a lot of dead trees that had blown over and plenty of dead standing ones as well.  

We spent a couple hours sawing up firewood and dragging it out of the woods.  It was a warm day and we had to stop a couple times to have a beer-break.

Once we were satisfied with the wood pile we lounged around the beach, waiting for the other half of our group to come back from the sea.  We watched a Minke whale that was quite close to the shore, and we watched the boat traffic coming and going.

I believe it was shortly after 5 pm when the seafarers came back to camp.  They had a long days paddle.  

Cathy was cooking salmon over the fire for her and Gary's supper and so Derek got the fire going.  I had already had my supper but she shared some salmon with me.... yep her expedition behavior skills are coming along quite nicely.

It wasn't long and the sun disappeared behind the hill and then darkness crept in on us.  We had a decent pile of firewood and Derek piled it all on at one point and it burned until about midnight when the last of us went off to our tents.

I was fully awake before 6 am.  I tried to go back to sleep but it wasn't going to happen and so I crawled out of my tent before 6:30 and had the beach to myself.  I watched a Minke whale swim along the shoreline, surfacing three times.

There was a skim of ice on my front hatch cover... a sign of the changing season.

While I was eating my breakfast I noticed a chair was floating in the water near the shore.  I retrieved it and realized it was Derek's.  I could not figure out how it got into the water as Derek had put it up by his kayak (well away from the waters edge) and there wasn't any wind during the night to have blown it down the beach.  Perhaps Goldilocks was around during the night and, finding that the chair was either too big or too small, she hurled it into the sea!!!

The rest of the guys began stirring and breakfasts were made and camp was broken.

The plan for the day was to handrail Rantem Cove back to the cars in Chance Cove...  

Not too far into the paddle I had to stop and re-adjust one of my foot pegs.  It had been moved 3 or 4 notches forward... I could not figure this one out... perhaps Goldilocks tried my kayak during the night and she has one leg shorter than the other!!!  

Hazen

Gary

Cathy

Derek

Tony

 We all arrived safe and sound back at Chance Cove...

For me it was a fantastically relaxed trip... just what I needed.  Thanks to Tony, Cathy, Hazen, Derek, and Gary for another fun time.

2016: Post 23 – Bull Arm

Labour Day weekend was approaching.  I was thinking I might just hop on a bus and go visit relatives for the weekend, so I decided not to be part of trip planning or to commit to anything.  

Clyde sent out a late-decision e-mail to see if a couple of us wanted to spend a night in Bull Arm.  I am still at the mercy of my paddling buddies for rides these days, so Clyde picked me up in the morning.  We met Shane and Derek along the way as we drove to Chance Cove for the put in.

Pics of the trip....

Put-in at Chance Cove (pic by Derek)

Clyde

Derek

Derek and Clyde

Clyde

Supper under Big Yellow

Shane enjoying the beach life

Enjoying the evening campfire (pic by Shane)

Early morning

The view at breakfast time

A morning walk along a Caribou trail

Looking down Stock Cove

 Not sure who was the most curious...

Derek

Take-out at Chance Cove

This is the fourth weekend in a row that I have camped...

2016: Post 22 – Is there another way to Garden Cove?

Derek sent out an e-mail last week to see if there was any interest in a one night camping trip on the weekend.  Everyone on the list were busy with other things, or just weren't interested.. except for Clyde and myself.  

Clyde picked me up Saturday morning and we met Derek at the TCH Irving and off we went, stopping at Goobies to pick up a couple things, and then carrying on.  We had decided to camp at Gulch Pond.

Clyde and I were in the lead car and we were having a grand chat about this and that.  I was looking at the Poplar trees and remarked how I liked them, but Clyde preferred Birch trees...  We noticed that Derek was no longer following behind us and  we surmised he must of stopped to answer a phone call.  Clyde slowed down but we carried on down the road.  Still chatting away, we passed Swift Current, Kilmory Resort, and Piper's Hole River...

Derek had not been to Garden Cove (the put-in location) before and he had still not caught up to us, so Clyde pulled over to wait for him... wouldn't want Derek to get lost on his first trip to Gulch Pond.

Next thing we knew Derek came up along side of us and asked "is there another way to Garden Cove because you guys passed a sign back there that said Garden Cove"?  Well now, Clyde and I have both been to Garden Cove three of four times before, but we were so engrossed in our conversation and admiring the trees and such that we didn't even see the sign to turn off to Garden Cove, or clue in to the fact that we had passed Swift Current, Kilmory Resort, and even Piper's Hole River!!  Derek wondered how far we'd actually would of gone if he we had not pulled over to wait for him...  Clyde said we would have figured it out when we got to Davis Cove... we had such a good laugh at ourselves...

We finally arrived in Garden Cove and loaded up the kayaks, got on the water, headed toward Bloody Point, and turned in to the inside channel...

The tide was ebbing and there was no wind, so the paddling was easy and we maintained a good speed.  When we arrived at Rattling Brook there wasn't a lot of water flowing over the little falls but there was plenty to cool off under...

We paddled on.  

I had not been in Jenny in two weeks and somewhere along the way she said "let's go for a little paddle..."  So I let her go and didn't bother to look back, knowing Derek and Clyde would know I was in a paddling mood.  I rounded the little headland abreast of Shag Rock and thought to pull up on the beach just around the corner, but then decided to carry on to La Plante Cove.

When I arrived at La Plante Cove I stopped to wait for the guys and to change my batteries in my GPS.  I noticed the moving average speed on my GPS and was impressed at the speed despite not having to work hard to achieve it... The ebbing tide really was having a positive impact.

I floated and waited for a while, and then I paddled away from shore to see where the guys were...  They had stopped at the beach that I had passed and I guessed they were having a late lunch...  I thought about paddling back to join them but instead just pulled up on a little beach near me and waited.  When they came along we carried on down to Gulch Head and on to the entrance to Gulch Pond.

As expected, with the falling tide the current was flowing out of the salt water pond...

The current was too much to paddle against and so we walked the kayaks up along the shore.

The first order of business  was to put up our tents.  I had brought my tent and my hammock.  The ground was quite dry and I decided I didn't want to do any brush clearing and so I pitched up my tent between Clyde and Derek.

It was somewhere between 4 and 4:30 pm by now and Derek declared it was time for a beer.  He kindly gave me one of his and the three of us sat in the warm sunshine and enjoyed Happy Hour.   Then Clyde gave me one of his beer and we all had another.  I don't drink much beer, but I have to say I really enjoyed those couple of beer, sitting in the sunshine, chatting away with these guys... 

Derek

Clyde

Then it was time to have a bit of supper.

We cleared up and then gathered up some firewood and got the evening fire started...

... and then we walked over to have a look at the current that was now running into Gulch Pond.

Derek decided to be Chief Fire Marshall for the evening and he kept a good blaze going...

When the majority of the wood had been burned and there was mostly coals left, Clyde pulled out some Jiffy Pop and set to work, determined to provide an evening snack.  Well, we didn't get our snack, but we had one hell of a good time watching Clyde do his best.

Let's just say I've never seen Neville or Shane, or even Hazen, set fire to Jiffy Pop!!!  Lord I wish I had a video of the incident.... but here's a picture of the charred remains....

Clyde decided to try to burn the evidence but I got a picture of that too....

We sat around the glowing coals, feeding bits of wood that was around.  Then we all had a real good laugh about how Clyde and I not only missed the turn off to Garden Cove, but drove through Swift Current, and past Kilmory Resort and even Piper's Hole River and still hadn't clued in that we had driven to far until Derek pulled up and asked if there was another way to Garden Cove... Derek was laughing so hard he said his stomach was hurting, which made us laugh even more... Good grief, that was funny!!! 

I am still laughing at the whole thing as I sit here trying to finish this blog entry.  That's the kind of thing we will remember years from now.  We'll be on a beach somewhere around a campfire, the three of us with other people too, and one of us will tell the story about how Clyde and I missed the turn off and just kept on going.... Yep.  Good stuff that is.

We checked the time... almost midnight.  We headed for our tents.

The next morning we got up to a heavy dew.  It was overcast as we ate our breakfast, but then the sky cleared and the sun came out before we left the beach.

The tide was flooding as we made our way back up the channel, and we had a bit of wind behind us.  We noticed three kayakers a little way behind us and wondered who it was. We had paddled almost half way back and so we pulled up on a beach for a rest.  The three kayakers caught up.  One of the them (yellow kayak) had done a trip with us last year, but I did not know the other two.  They had paddled down in the area on Friday, spent a couple nights on Barhaven Island, and were on their way back to Garden Cove. 

The three campers carried on after we had a little chat and then we got back on the water after a while as well.  We watched them handrail along the shoreline, but we opted to paddle out in the channel, taking advantage of the wind in our back and the flooding tide to help us make faster work of the paddle back to the cars.

As we drove away from Garden Cove, Clyde joked that we had better watch for the turn off back to the Trans Canada... Derek was ahead of us this time and so it wasn't likely that he would be coming along to tell us we were going the wrong way... 

What a fun trip this was.