Archive for the ‘kayaking’ Category

Hello from Buen Suceso Bay, on the east coast of Tierra del Fuego! Barry and I are  6 days into our kayaking trip and are having a great time.  The first few days down the Northeast coast were similar scenery to last year  with low sandy grey cliffs, gravel beaches and occasional wide peaty rivers.   We have seen so many birds, lots of different species and so many of them. The futher south we paddled, the wilder and more rugged the coast became, the further we got from roads and human influence, the stronger the tides, and the more birds, sealions and fur seals we saw.  The coast became rockier with more trees and greenery.  I love wild places where wildlife thrives without too much disruption from man. There are always birds flying overhead, one day a cloud of hundreds of dark petrels  flying low over the waves, yesterday a curious albatros, black and white cormorants that look like penguins (to us anyway!), a funky looking heron, ducks, geese, vultures. There is even a small perfectly white bird which feeds on sealion and furseal poo!! There have seen an awful lot of them!  Not sure why they are white, though?

We´ve camped in some great spots. Every day we´ve landed early enough to take a look around the area. One night we camped near a cliff where 11 condors were roosting and saw a few of them soaring above majestically. That was amazing.  Last night we slept in a refugio (refuge) hut in Bahia Tethis. Many years ago this place  was  a sealion factory.  There are old ovens and ramshakle buildings and a huge pile of rotting sealion pelts. It looks as if people just left one day and left things where they were. The ´refugio´ was fantastic though. I don t know who made it into a wonderful shelter, but thank you. We spent most of the day indoors, lit the wood burning stove, cooked pita breads with melted cheese and ham, followed by pancakes with dulce de leche, drank plenty of drinks and enjoyed a wonderful place.

We have had pretty good conditions most days. It is usually so windy here but it hasn´t been too bad most days, and there isn´t much swell so we haven´t had any surf landings. I think that´s partly because weve had a lot of early  morning paddle and have b been off the water pretty early and the winds tend to get stronger later in the day. Yesterday we were off the water at 10am!!

The biggest challenge has been when the tide goes out! It goes out 2 miles in places along that NE coast and there are many shallow sharp rocks. One day the wind was strong and offshore and we didnt want to go around all the rocks 2 miles offshore as the wind was pushing us away from land forcefully. We tried to stay inside some of the rocks (a tactic that had worked the day before) but on this occassion we got trapped in a huge bay that was emptying fast, exposing razor sharp rocks,   thick kelp beds and  noisy rapids as the tide flowed over rock shelves! After trying to paddle out to sea for half an hour, we gave up and padded back into shore. We had to carry the kayaks over some exposed rocks and then found deeper water again and could kayak to a steep gravel beech, where we stopped early!

Today we arrived at Buen Suceso where we knew there was an Armada post. It s a beautiful spot, a golden sandy spot surrounded by mountains, with a view across to the magnificant Islas de las Estados.  5 men live here for 45 days, then a boat comes and takes them back to Ushuaia and brings the next lot of workers! We have spent most of the day chatting to the guys, and they fed us  delicious hot chocolate followed by steak for lunch! Expedition life is really tough! Actually, I´ve felt very content and happy most of the time on this trip!

We hope to leave here tomorrow and head down to the SE tip of  the coastline where we spotted a beach on google earth. From there, we expect headwinds all the way back to Ushuaia so it may take us some time to get there! We will paddle when the winds are less strong and rest when the white caps litter the bays.

Thanks to Sonja, who gave us some presents before we came away with dates on! We got to open the first one yesterday which was a very welcome chocolate bar and seseme seed bar!! Thanks also to Monica for going out of her way (and always saying ¨its nothing¨) us get to Punta Maria with everything we needed.

About a month ago, we met Monica and Marcelo for the first time. They drove for over 2 hours to see us when we first landed our kayaks in Argentina. Barry’s wrist was hurting a lot and we asked them if we could come and stay with them for in Rio Grande for 2 or 3 days.  30 days on, we laugh about our initial request… what would they have said if we had asked to stay for 3 weeks, and then keep reappearing?

In reality, we have all become good friends  & we have learnt how kind and generous our hosts both are (although I am still amazed that they seemed happy to have us staying with them for so long). Yesterday they drove us for 3 hours to Porvenir in Chile, where we took the ferry to Punta Arenas.  We could have taken the bus but it was great to spend the last few hours on Isla Grande with Moni & Marcelo.  We also got to see a different part of the island as we cut west to the coast, driving alongside the huge bay that leads to the ferry town. The tyres crunched over the dirt road as we cruised over the flat barren landscape, dotted with occasional estancias and even more occasional trees. Every few miles, a few lonely fishermens shacks and boats littered the shore.

We took the ferry west across the Straits of Magellan to Punta Arenas and I couldn’t help notice that it was a perfect following sea if we were heading east. Kiko met us on the other side, and despite the fact he is going on holiday first thing in the morning today, he made us feel very welcome, fed us pizza & got up at 3.30am to take us to the airport. I am still gutted about not being able to continue our trip – when I stood on the beach for the last time, listening to the waves pounding on the pebbles, feeling the wind blowing through my hair and yearning for the adventures waiting further down the coast, it was hard to walk away from that…… but as we keep saying, and many of our friends have pointed out, the kayaking adventure is still there for another day, and by not kayaking, we have build strong friendships and shared great experiences.

The kayaks are still in Rio Grande. One of them now belongs to Marcelo but he has promised to let us use it when we return. We are now in Santiago airport on the way home, and looking forward to catching up with friends. I have a feeling that a part of my brain will keep on thinking about that view south until I come back! After all, no-one said goodbye, only “hasta luego”! 

This weekend, Barry and I paddled joined Kev, Gill, Chris & Matt for a paddle down the Menai Straits and an overnight camp at Aber Menai Point. Although, the snow on the Welsh mountains has largely melted it was still a frosty cold night, so was a good chance for Barry and I to test out some of the kit that we’re planing to take to Tierra del Fuego. It was exciting to sleep in our new Hilleberg Tarra tent for the first time and our first impressions are great. It’s roomy, very sturdy and a fantastic shade of red! We’ve both got a large porch to ourselves so there will be no squabbling over space to put our kit! The footprint extends underneath the porches so our kit is off any wet soggy (or frosty!) ground.

While we were testing out our kit, it wasn’t all serious! I am happy to confess that we spent most of the evening in Kev & Gill’s big family size tent, crowded round Kev’s homemade fire pit, drinking mulled wine and scoffing mince pies! Kev & Gill were in a canoe which meant they had lots of space to make life very comfortable!

I was also trying out a few new bits of kit from Kokatat. I’ve had the dry suit that I’ll take on the trip for a few months already and I’ve been wearing it most of the winter so far! but on Friday I received a box with some extra goodies in it. I tried out my new destination paddling trousers which I’ll live in when I’m on land. They are very comfy, and fit over my thermals nicely ( which was definitely needed on Saturday night!). I also had on Kokatat’s long sleeved base layer which is very warm and snug, and the new Msfit tour buoyancy aid ( PFD). The new Msfit has slightly larger pockets than the original one and has a new piece of material over where you can clip your knife, so that it’s less likely to get caught on anything. Thanks to Kev & Gill for inviting us to join them! I’m looking forward to a couple of months of camping in Tierra del Fuego. 3 weeks to go!

Today we had the privilege of helping Francesco’s family with their annual grape harvest. Paola, his mother, has a hectare of land full of grape vines, olive trees and apple trees. About 20 family and friends gathered to help pick the grapes, including Barry, Cheri, Turner, Roger & Sonja & me. The grapes were poured into a machine which separated the stalks, and the resulting juice and grapes were poured into 2 huge vats. They’ll sit there for 4 days, being stirred lovingly by Paola, then the liquid will be drained off and stored in stainless steel VATS. By January, the wine will be ready to drink. There are no additives in it and if it’s anything like this years wine, it will be delicious! In traditional style, once the work was done, we all sat down to a HUGE feast of delicious food, which Paola and others had been preparing for several days. oh, and some of this years wine, of course. It’s not hard to see why they have a siesta in Italy!

It was a fantastic end to a great stay in Sicily.