Brownsea

I didn’t blog last week for a few reasons, one of which was because I didn’t really get up to much. After posting about my last few events, and the potential to do the channel crossing by kayak, it didn’t seem worth it for a single post about a single parkrun (which wasn’t particularly fast either).

Saying that I did visit a physio for my ongoing rotator cuff injury. She identified so many bits of me which are tight, misaligned, or injured. With everything that is apparently wrong with me, I’m surprised that I am able to physically function at all. After a few tests and exploratory prods she pummelled my back and shoulder until bone and sinew had been suitably loosened up. It was quite uncomfortable at the time but did do a lot to improve the injury… And then this weekend happened and I now need to go and see her again.

This weekend was a trip to Brownsea Island organised by a group of watersports coaches who are closely associated with the Scouts. Brownsea (as I’m sure you already know), was where Baden Powel chose to hold the first ever Scout camp, and this trip is an annual pilgrimage by canoe. The diamond channel crossing team saw this as a good training opportunity and were generously allowed to take kayaks rather than canoes this year. Four of us took two double sea kayaks.

As a camping trip we had to take everything we would need for an overnight stop, including our food, tent, clothes, and other must have essentials for surviving a night in the wild (mainly wine, and insect repellent). Which meant the boat was loaded with probably an additional 20 or 30 kilos of equipment, added to an already weighty plastic K2 I would guess we were trying to shift upward of 60 kilos. Over recent months I’ve got used to glass K1 boats weighing less than a quarter of that.



Brownsea by Kayak, Day 1

We set off from a campsite near Wareham putting in onto a tidal section of a river (I think the Frome but like normal, I wasn’t really paying attention). We then paddled down through the tidal mud flats keenly sticking to the channel (I did this trip a few years ago in canoe and got stranded on a sand bar as the tide went out) and then we headed out across a wider expanse of sea to the island. The conditions were beautiful, the weather was with us and there was not much in the way of wind which meant the water was so calm.

On the first day we covered the twelve kilometres in about two hours which was not bad considering the weight of the boats. While under power the weight wasn't much more noticeable as momentum just punched the boat through the water, but getting them going in the first place was really hard, even the loss of one of the paddlers effort made shifting the boat a huge strain and the steering was so vague.

We were ashore and setting up camp by midday but my shoulder was giving me some warning signs, and despite an impromptu deep tissue massage I decided that I shouldn’t go back out for a bit more kayaking as planned. Instead we roved around the island looking for Geocaches and Pokémon. (Yes, I too, like pretty much everyone else in the world, am playing Pokémon Go!).

Brownsea by Kayak, Day 2

Day two we broke camp, loaded the boats again and put to sea. The second day was a much shorter trip back to mainland for the canoes, but as our kayaks were much quicker and we needed to get training mileage in we did a circuit of Brownsea before heading to the get out. Day two was about ten kilometres and another hour and a half of paddling strain on my shoulder.

So here I am, Monday, tired and sunburned, with a shoulder that is worse than it was two weeks ago. I was told by my physio that I had to rest it and I know now that I am going to have to do just that if I am going to be available for the crossing in August.