Long Overdue Beach Trip

Nan and I took off for a long overdue beach trip to do a little furniture shuffling and yard work. My sister has recently moved back to Raleigh and had an extra sofa so we decided to update the furniture at the beach a little. There was still some debris from Hurricane Hannah that needed to be cleaned up as well as a whole summer's growth to be pruned and dealt with. I got in a good day of paddling the surf with a good north wind holding up some nice 3' spilling breakers. The water is still warm and a drytop with a light layer underneath was plenty to stay warm. The weather had a nip in the air in the mornings but days were nice and beautiful blue. Watching some surf fishers, it appeared the small blues were in on the schools of fingerling mullet and there were spanish mackerel jumping everywhere.

Transition

The water and air are cooling down enough that it's time to wind down the flatwater and beginner kayak instruction for the year and start looking for some water of my own in earnest. Last week's trip to the Russell Fork, New River Gorge and Yough was a good start toward that goal. It's still quite dry around here. The transition in seasons also leads me to start looking homeward to chores that need to get done. Between sessions of chainsawing up some downfall in the yard, I'm finishing up some paperwork for the ACA recreation committee and preparing for the upcoming long weekend of the ACA Instructor's conference, SEIC meeting and ACA Board meeting. I'm looking forward to chairing the Club Instructors' roundtable discussion and hope we can get some good feedback and ideas from instructors to take forward.

I've been kept pretty busy lately with a gung-ho group of sea kayakers in the Triangle who are organizing a local flatwater/sea kayak paddling club. Stay tuned to see what happens with this group. They are on fire right now and I expect to see big things come from their efforts.

I finally broke down and bought a used copy of "Deliverance" today, figuring it was a de rigeur addition to any paddler's library.

It's paddle season, apparently

Saturday 9/27 was spent on the Eno River in Durham teaching a man and his 13-YO son the fine art of River Kayaking. Flow was up to about 2.9 feet at Hillsborough so we had fairly easy time making it down the river. The father took a few dips but the son was a hoot. After some initial instability, the young-un started bombing down the river.

Monday-Wed. I took off down the Waccamaw from Longs, SC to Conway SC, about 45 river miles, with Paul and Pete.We had a relaxing time down this beautiful blackwater coastal river. Good campsites were few and far between due to either the very low cypress swamp or heavily shrubbed higher ground. Skeeters were still bad with daytimes in the upper 70s and nights in the low 60s, but with enough DEET, it was bearable. You have to love paddling with canoeists (I was in kayak). We had a great steak, roasted garlic, baked potato and peas dinner the first night thanks to immense coolers that canoes will handle (unlike the dehydrated fare I stuffed in my yak). Thanks to Paul for inviting me to join them.