Unless I am able to develop a new roll that nobody else has, but that is a long shot, there.
However, I finally went on a trek/mini expedition that
I need to come up with a creative title for it, but it is, in essence, the next step in my progression as a paddler and the middle or meat of an awesome three-week sandwich that will see me go from paddling two different boats in a lake, to camping and kayaking along the coast, to working on more of my whitewater skills in Tennessee. Man, am I spoiled, or what?
You may recall that last year (2014) I went on a weekend trip into the Okefenokee Swamp with Dave, my dad, and a few others from the Canoe and Kayak Club of Augusta (GA). That's really what caused me to start this blog, honestly. That was my first experience with having to camp out of a kayak and learning to pack everything you need for a camping trip into a kayak. Before that, I was learning whitewater and before that, it was basic paddling, safety and rescue techniques.
So, it is only natural that I keep going, right? Well, this trip up a small section of the South Carolina coast was just that: the next step in Milledge (IV) becoming a better, more experienced paddler.
Without further ado, here is my weekend trek to Capers Island - Part 1 of 3
On Friday, June 12, 2015, Dave, Ian Buckley and I set out from North Augusta/Augusta/Aiken and headed to the coast with the intent of paddling from the marina located at Isle of Palms up to the north beach of Capers Island and back over a three day stretch. In that time, we planned on covering at least 24 miles (I may be off a hair here) or more depending on weather conditions and we would be at a location that did not have any of the basic necessities that we all take for granted practically every day: indoor plumbing, fresh water, AC, electricity, AC, ice, prepared food.
Now, luckily we were just a semi-short paddle (or boat ride if need be) away from all of those in case the proverbial poo hit the proverbial fan. Also, Dave is a very experienced paddler and hiker, and always has plans B through Z covered. He had ways to listen to the constantly changing weather reports, a radio with proper channels to listen to the Coast Guard frequencies, he had a personal location device (I think I got that wrong, but you get the picture), and he also had a chart of the area as well as the most up-to-date tide charts for the days we were scheduled to be out there. As well as the cell phone number of the local sheriff's department. The man really knows what he is doing and is teaching me a lot in regards to taking this types of trips.
First thing first, though, before leaving, I had to get a different boat. For those of you who know me, you know that I fairly recently sold my Liquid Logic Remix 69 in favor of purchasing a brand spanking new Liquid Logic Stomper 90. I went from one whitewater creeker to another. And neither of those would do for this trip. My dad and mom also have two boats that are 12 and 13 feet long, but they are wider and more equipped for rivers and lakes, not swells and surf.
Luckily, our club president, Bernie, had an extra boat: a 17' Perception Eclipse that he has held onto as a loaner and he was gracious enough to loan it to me (Thank you, again, Bernie!). What was even better, or maybe worse for my bank account, was that as soon as I sat in the boat a couple of weeks ago to test it out, I fell in love and it fit me just about as perfectly as a boat could/should. I now know what my next boat will be come the off-season... but don't think I'm trading in my whitewater Stomper just yet. No sir.
Anyways, we had to have nice, long boats to cram some of the following equipment into each of our boats (and even other stuff I forgot): 3-4 gallons of water, 2 breakfasts, 3 lunches, 2 dinners, small snack bars for during the day, extra paddle, helmet, tent, sleeping gear, eating utensils, water bottle(s) for during the day, PFD (wearing that one), sun protection, bug protection (if you want it), water shoes, hiking shoes (if you wanted), changes of clothes (let's get real, I may have worn the same outer pants and shirt, but I still changed my underwear. I'm not THAT hard core), toiletries (TP, shovel for small trench digging, toothbrush, toothpaste, deodorant), GoPro cameras for documenting...
By the time it was all said and done, both front and back hatches of my boat were tightly filled to where I literally couldn't fit anything else in there even if I wanted to. So the longer the boat, the better for that, as well as it helped in the swells. But I'll get to that in a bit.
Now then, before I get into the real meat of the journey, let me show you what we did. For reference:
- Orange is Friday's first leg,
- Red is Friday's second leg,
- Green is Saturday (note: it is out along Bull Island and back then out to the inter coastal and back)
- Blue is Sunday's first leg,
- Purple is Sunday's final leg,
- The Yellow spots are the three important points or stops for reference.
Anyways, back to the story and Friday's portion of the trek:
We met at Dave's house and were on the road by 6:15 AM. Probably the biggest thing to remember throughout this entire trip is that all of our paddling was done with 2 things in mind: first and foremost, the tides ruled when and where we could go but we also did keep an eye on the second part, weather and heat. We did most of our paddling in the morning and early afternoon.
As we got into Isle of Palms, we hit our first big snag as there was a bad wreck on the bridge heading onto the island. I could tell that Dave was a bit nervous about this because we did not want to be paddling against the tide, we wanted to be riding the tide as it went out for low tide.
However, we were making such good time ahead of that, that we didn't have an issue, really. We were able to get to the marina still in plenty of time and the three of us packed our kayaks efficiently and in a timely manner. Dave did point out here it was more important to make certain we packed everything properly and not worry about the time. If we needed to, we could wait around until the next tide change, but you could also tell that none of us liked that idea (besides, we all would do plenty of sitting around waiting/relaxing later).
Let me tell you this, a fully-loaded kayak is an absolute bear to handle... on land. It took all three of us to muscle the boats down the slippery boat ramp one at a time to get into the water. But once we were on there, it really was almost a breeze. I was honestly surprised at how well my boat handled under load. Although, looking back, I could have shifted a little more of the weight to the back to help with the skeg/rudder.
Anyways, we were off and rolling around 11:30-noon. We paddled for about an hour and that took us along the intracoastal waterway for a small stretch before we hung a right just after clearing the northern tip of Isle of Palms to cut between there and Dewees Island. I don't know a lot about the area, but Dave informed Ian and me that Dewees is privately owned but you can still get off the water onto the beach. And that is where we took our first break, a quick lunch on the southern-most tip of the main portion of Dewees Island.
For reference, the picture above is a closer view of the marina (towards the bottom and a quarter of the way in from the left) and where we stopped for lunch (top and a little more than the same distance in from the right).
We only took about a 15-30 minute break for lunch before we were off again, and that is A-OK with me. I was ready to get a little wet and experience this trek a bit more.
So, this is a closer view without the line of where we went after lunch, but we took off from the southern-most tip of Dewees and had to swing out pretty wide at this time of day to clear a couple of sandbars that have formed over the last few years. It's interesting to note how much the coast has changed according to Dave over the last 5, 10, 15 years. The biggest changes to the area have been the addition of those two sandbars you see between Dewees/Capers and Capers/Bull but also the erosion of Capers Island's front shore. Seriously, just Google Capers Island Bone Yard and you'd be amazed to see the images (note, not real bones, trees. It's almost 75% or more the beach).
Like I said, we had to go pretty far out into the water and at our furthest point, Dave believes we were about a mile off shore. This was mostly because we were trying to avoid the more shallow waters where breakers were forming. Those could cause us a lot of problems, especially if we weren't paying attention.
But we still had to deal with the swells. We were really lucky all weekend as the seas were relatively calm and only rolling around a foot to 2 feet most of the time with an occasional three-foot swell. This is where the skeg/rudder really came in handy. A lot of people think it is for turning, but it really is more for helping the boat track straight. Yes, I used it and some edging to help with some turns (handles like a dream, surprisingly for such a long boat), but it really helped me out in the swells when I was focused on staying straight.
As we got further and further along, you could really start to see Capers and what Dave and others have said. It is amazing how the forest is right along the beach, but not because it grew that way. Now, you may not believe in global warming, but climate change is definitely happening. And, again, whether you believe we, as humans, are to blame for this or it's cyclical (or a little of both), the tides really are rising. The best evidence is right there on Capers' front beach.
Also as we were paddling, I noticed a lot, A LOT of jelly fish in the water. I hate jelly fish, but these supposedly can't sting you.
Yeah, right.
After nearly 3 hours of paddling, total, we came to the really fun part. As I said before, at the north end of Capers a huge sandbar has formed and it has created 2 channels into that inlet. Since we were camping on the northern beach of Capers all weekend, there was no sense in going around and coming back, so we made a beeline and cut through the breakers of the first and smaller channel.
You can really see the sandbar here, but you cannot see the breakers in that first little channel. They were a lot of fun and Dave had to give me and Ian a little instruction to begin with. The biggest thing to remember when playing in the surf is to let the boat go and to not tense up. As soon as you tense up, you are probably going to flip over. If you don't feel comfortable with a particular wave, just back paddle and it will pass you by, allowing you to try again.
But why would you back paddle? Seriously.
I know, there really are times when that can come in handy, but I had so much fun catching a couple of waves and even had one turn my boat at which point I called upon another thing Dave taught me - lean into the wave and edge and you can surf along the wave. Just have your low brace there to help. And, sure enough, I caught a couple short rides that way and it was just so cool.
After we finally punched through, it was just a very short paddle over to the beach where we scoped out where high tide had been before so we could pitch our tents. We also made sure to pay attention to where the wind was going to be coming from (mostly south to south-west all weekend) so our tents wouldn't blow away. We needed a breeze to keep us cool and keep the no-see-ums and other bugs at bay, but not gail-force winds. FYI, you need a permit to camp overnight on Capers Island and the only two locations you can camp on are the northern tip and the southern tip (then again, I don't know why you'd want to camp amongst the thick foliage on the outer beach or in the marsh areas on the inner part of the island.
After all of that, we went for a short hike along the shore to check out the bone yard up close. It really is amazing to see how the shoreline is claiming the trees and forest. I mean, it is just taking out huge, old trees. But I was also surprised to see more than 10 dead horseshoe crabs. They were all along the beach as we hiked. But, we couldn't stay long because the tide was quickly coming back in and it was close to dinner time.
Now, you can bet I had no problem falling asleep, even on some hard-packed sand. But not before we were treated to one of the coolest sunsets I have seen in quite some time. It was really a good start to the trip.
Now, you can bet I had no problem falling asleep, even on some hard-packed sand. But not before we were treated to one of the coolest sunsets I have seen in quite some time. It was really a good start to the trip.
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