Surfski Knowledge Base

Saturday morning….early
Larry Goolsby
04/23/05 #209

Dear Don, Dean, Mike and whoever else…..First I want to apologize for not being at the 2 PM Saturday paddle. Shaun and I had great intentions on paddling with you guys but we ran out of gas. My day started with a 6:30 AM call from Shaun (bastard needs to stay up later) wanting to know if I was awake yet. I said of course I was because I had to wake up to answer the phone (duh). Anyway, he said the bay was flat as glass and wanted me to grab the double Fenn and meet him at Fairhaven for an early morning paddle. The plan was to go out to Eliza Island, have a cup of coffee, head back to Fairhaven for lunch and then join up with you at 2 PM. Piece-o-cake.

Since my wife was out of town (Las Vegas, don't ask me why), it was my job to take the dog for a walk or the dog would take herself for a walk. When I left the house I noticed that the wind was blowing about 10 - 15 out of the northwest. So on my way to Fairhaven, I had to stop and walk the dog because she will not take a dump anywhere near our yard (don't ask me why). Sure enough, when I got to Fairhaven at 8 AM, it was pretty calm and serene looking. We took off for Eliza confident that we would be back in about 2 hours. When we got near Hale passage (Hell's half acre)we encountered that northwest wind and the sound end of Lummi/Hale passage started to get a bit rough. Hale passage is a great channel for wind so the waves were building up and hitting our beam. We thought we had it beat but somehow one errant wave knocked us off our ski and into the warm waters of Puget Sound just before we rounded the safety of Eliza island (20 more strokes and we would have made it). No problem remounting and we circled around the point on Eliza and beached in front of Shaun's cabin to be greeted by his lovely wife and some coffee.

The trip back home became even more interesting than the trip out with the wind blowing even harder and the waves were square with our beam if we tried to aim straight for Fairhaven. After the first refreshing swim on the return trip, we chose to head due north for a distance and then tack southeast in order to eventually get back to the cars. As we turned and headed southeast, the waves were building even bigger and when we tried to aim for the mainland, we went swimming one more time. We were both quite happy to be out there since this was giving us some necessary training that we had both obviously needed. We headed north one more time for about 2 miles and this time we managed to turn and head due east for Fairhaven without dumping it once again. However, this tortuous course meant that we had paddled 17-18 miles instead of the intended 14. We wussed out because we pictured you fresh young alpha males paddling like there was no tomorrow and we were spent. I'm sure it would have been a lot of fun. However, we did gain a bitch-load of confidence in paddling the double in rough conditions and were pretty proud of the fact that we didn't dump when the conditions got even bigger near Fairhaven.
Hope we get another opportunity to paddle together again soon.
Larry G.

lbussinger50 <lbussinger@…>
04/24/05 #210

Larry,
If you thought that was rough stuff, then you'll need to learn how to pray before Bowen Island.
LB

Sat morn @9
Reivers Dustin
04/24/05 #211

It really was glassy. Larry B, Kirk C, Ryler and I headed for Eliza. We saw that LG & Shaun had the double out. About half-way over there was a wind-line and left-over chop from Hale's passage. A steady 10 -15 mph NWster was pushing occaisional white-caps over. We just paddled to the beach on the North side and took our break there. As we were leaving we spotted the double heading East from the South end of the island. We headed Northeast looking for a potential ride due East toward Chuckanut.

I had borrowed Peter's Mako for Ryler and the boat wasn't fitted that well. I noticed that the boat was rocking under him almost to the point of showing rudder. LB swears the kid has no bones in him. Like sharkboy, he just bends. Ry slowed a little, but kept a steady pace even though it was kinda crappy on the way back. Just South of Post Point he overcorrected with rudder and dumped. I feel funny about putting him in that situation. But, he just thinks it was a great paddle: his first run to Eliza.

That's twice I've been surprized about conditions over there. I spoke with a respected local touring paddler. In his opinion Hale's passage is Whatcom's most dangerous area. It can go bad really quickly. Stay sharp on the big crossings, guys.

Later, LB and I got a look at Don's new Hayden. (The 2:00 pm paddler group.) The surprize for me was how low the footwells are, yet the seat is shallow. It looks like a tremendous ergonomic advantage. My image of the body mechanics is, for example, bent over rowing with weights at ankles versus bent over rowing with weights just below the chest. There were other tricks in the hull design, too.

Anyone hear anything about the American Lake Race?

Re: Saturday morning….early
Larry Goolsby
04/24/05 #214

I doubt that Shaun and I are ready to take the double to the Bowen island race but we are keeping that option open. The Lake Whatcom Classic was a fun race for us because we were either with or against the waves and the long hull catches every possible ride. However, this double Fenn is very twitchy compared to a single and the crossing from Eliza did test our balance over and over. We did gain a lot of skill on that outing and with a few more days like that, maybe the Bowen island race might be in our sights. Paddling a double in rough conditions is much more challenging than doing it in a single and further gain is going to require some saddle time. Since the boat is more challenging, it is also more fun when it all comes together. Both paddlers have to be in sequence at all times or the boat won't reach it's potential. If the rocking of the boat causes one of the paddlers to change the stroke, then everything is out of sequence and all balance is lost. I think its best for us to show up at a race with both the double and our Hukis and make the decision before laying down our entry fee.
Larry G