2007 Reports
February 2007. Lucy, Dave, Gav, Rebekka, Nigel, Marie-Louise, Stephen.
From Cove Harbour, S to (nearly at) Portlethen. Stunning day – blue sky, sun, calm North Sea, good company! 5hr (10km) trip including a half hour stop at pebble beach at May Craig (1km S of Findon; ˝ km N of Portlethen). We explored the Caves, Sloughs and Boos, rock-hopping on the way S, but headed straight back to Cove on the way back. Rebekka spotted 2 harbour porpoises, right beside Lucy's boat! The Skoda locked itself with the keys in the ignition, so Gav and R gave Dave a lift back to Banchory to get the Renault; meanwhile, Lucy and the others enjoyed food and beers at Steve’s house in Cove!
Saturday 28th April 2007. From Catterline along the bird cliffs of Fowlsheugh. Dave, Lucy, Gavin, Rebekka, Nigel, Marie-Louise, Dave. Beautiful day, but a lot of confused choppiness on the way out (E wind against ebb tide?) – my boat was slapping pretty badly on each landing - a pretty wet ride. The birds are fully back on the cliffs courting, calling, copulating, and taking off frequently en masse. Magnificent, awe-inspiring giant flights of guillemots over our heads and around as at all times, sometimes v v intense, with the movement and noise. Some puffins on the water. Some kittiwakes already have nests, most carrying nest material back. Didn’t explore the caves so as not to disturb the birds, and low tide meant some were cave entrances blocked with rocks. We found a sleeping seal near one cave, high and dry up on the rocks, completely oblivious to us watching it a few feet away! Nice rock-hopping back into Catterline. Back in the harbour, Dave and Lucy practiced the modified X-rescue and Eskimo rescue (him the swimmer each time). A thoroughly brilliant and enjoyable afternoon! 3-hr trip: 14.30-17.30.
Thursday 17th May. Lucy & Dave, Rebecca & Gavin, Dave, Phil, Imogen & Ken. Stonehaven. First official Integrate Paddling Thursday trip of the season. However, the forecast was for winds increasing to Force 6-7 and indeed the swell was big (>1m) and breaking round Capsize Point and well beyond. White horses everywhere. Ken was in his new Kevlar Nordkapp and found it too tippy round the point, so returned to the calm of the harbour. Imogen, Dave & I accompanied him, as we wouldn’t have particularly enjoyed the trip in those conditions anyway. We did a bit of exploring the geos and rocks, and practiced hanging draws and bow rudders. The others continued, but didn’t go far or for long and soon rejoined us in the harbour for practice. Dave practiced rolling (failed), Eskimo rescues and wet rescues (with Gav). The first 2 of these he did in big breaking swell near Downer Point! Very brave of him, and they managed the rescues with no problem, even in those waves – very impressive, and very confidence giving to the rest of us! Phil impressed us all with rolling successfully and recovering from almost upside-down using high braces. Dave and I practiced Eskimo rescues. The North Sea felt like a warm bath compared to Knockburn Loch!
Thursday 21st June. Integrate Paddling trip to Boddam. Mark, Susi & Susi's brother visiting from Germany (in a double), Canadian guy and Louise (in a double), Gav, Lucy. The haar was so thick that we could hardly see the lighthouse from our launch point in the harbour. Sea state was calm, but there was a moderate swell which made Louise seasick, so we didn't go far. Lovely sandstone cliffs and geos, and guillemots, razorbills and kittiwakes with fluffy chicks on the cliffs. Surprisingly, no seals were seen, maybe because it had just been high tide (they get washed off the rocks!) It would be lovely to come back here on a weekend with no haar, so we can see the scenery better!
Thursday 28th June. Integrate Paddling trip from Cove for a beach clean-up. Clare G, Nigel, Gav, Lucy. With a strong southerly breeze (F4-5?) the sea was pretty choppy and Clare had unfortunately got the blue club Capella with the missing foot peg, so understandably found the conditions rather dodgy. Therefore, after about 5 mins of paddling into a head-wind, we decided it would be safer to not carry on to the beaches but paddle around nearer the harbour. Lucy enjoyed practicing swell surfing while Gav and Nigel explored the skerries immediately N of the harbour.
Thursday 2nd August
Integrate evening trip from Stonehaven. Lucy & Dave, Dave Shannon, Nigel, Graham.
One of the best evening paddles of the year. It was the first time that I had ever seen Capsize (Downer) Point calm - hardly a wave in sight. Rain was forecast, but we hardly got any at all, just a bit at the end of the evening. Instead we were treated to some lovely rainbow effects. Due to the calmness, we went a fair way South, almost to the N end of the Fowlsheugh cliffs. We enjoyed rock-hopping around the lovely, secret and magnificent Tremuda Bay. We discovered the totally awe-inspiring tunnel through a headland, with a wonderful tie-dyed green, black and white roof. It is a tunnel that would not be ashamed amongst those in Shetland! The tunnel entrance is beside a magnificent waterfall that free-falls all the way down the cliff to the water onto the bow of your kayak! As if all this wasn't fantastic enough, we had to then eat the cherry on the icing of the cake: in a beautiful cliff-girt geo were lots of young 1-2 year old grey seals (confident teenagers!). One of them was particularly confident and sniffed and pushed our sterns, bows and even our paddles!!!! We couldn't believe it, being inspected so closely by a wild sea creature! When it sniffed us it would point all its whiskers forwards as tactile fingers/tentacles - v interesting. Of course, noone had brought their camera - doh! But the amazingness didn't stop there: being a zoologist I couldn't tear myself away and stayed on my own while everyone else had started to paddle back to Stonehaven. Maybe this made the seal even more confident - it came increasingly closer to me, until it actually put its paws/flippers on my spray deck (it had really long finger nails!) and tried to heave itself onto my lap! It tried this several times, but kept slipping off - I had a brace ready in case it nearly capsized me! Its face must have been only inches away from mine! Eventually I had to reluctantly tear myself away from this wonderful animal and follow the others home through the beautiful silky grey water. What a fantastic paddle - it will be hard to ever beat it.
Thursday 16th August
Integrate evening trip from Portlethen. Dave, me and Phil. We had a lovely pleasant leisurely rock-hopping paddle for 1hr 40 mins (7km) – we got to the point just N of Newtonhill. It was quite calm and the colours in the sky were lovely and it didn’t rain! No caves or tunnels, but nice rock scenery, and the geology (folded patterns) is different from the conglomerate around Stonehaven/Catterline. On the way back we picked up a rock-full of seals, and one big male followed us (very closely!) all the way back to the harbour, doing grey whale impressions. Back in the harbour Dave and I practiced high braces and managed to get over quite far. Meanwhile, poor Phil was being sick between the rocks, due to some horrid illness – he wasn’t feeling
well when he arrived for the paddle but still managed to remain cheerful! The nights are closing in – it was getting dark when we got back at 21:10.
