Sunday, February 19th, 2006. Fellowmen.
We launched yesterday from a small fishing harbour where locals seemed to find us disruptive and took a South bearing. Soon the gleaming light washed us in silence. We coasted against a low swell looking at the rumpled cliffs and the small inlets that dented the shoreline.
I halted and detoured often to let the main group reach me. I used the short stops to scull for support and to rehearse draw on the move strokes. The practice of high brace telemark turns -tight bow rudder strokes- satisfied me the most. The group followed its steady, lineal progress.
One hour and a half later, three of us arrived at the harbour of L’Ampolla. I braced and sculled with a carbon Manta Ray paddle that I borrowed from Angel. As usual I was the last one to leave the water. The group assembled while our leader gazed intently as an English pointer, as he scouted for a bar. An hour later, beer consumption had replaced any loss of weight that paddling might had induced.
We launched again and after a bare mile, the party landed in a white short beach led by the inspired directions of our enlightened helmsman. We had our lunch under the disturbed stares of two naked blondes that for a long while, found disgust in the ruse of feigning a kayak trip to disguise an evident aim to peek furtively.
We continued our way back in sustained following seas. I slid down half an inch my skeg and tracked, edging for course corrections while I played changing from low angle to high angle strokes and then to the Greenland abdominal crunch. I noticed that for months, I had unconsciously kept my legs almost straight inside the cockpit with only a slight bent of the knees that I just alter for edging and rolling. Now, the contact of the knees with the deck felt awkward and I could tell how it had hampered before my control over the boat.
We got to the port, loaded the boats in the trailer and checked in a close hotel with small, clean, nice rooms. I shared one with James who accepted every disturbance seemingly unaffected by inconvenience and bother. We left our reduced retreat of good manners to walk leisurely across the little town. It was a very short walk.
An early dinner, a fruitless pursuit for any woman above the level of repulsive. We all went to bed early.
The pharmacist spent a very vexatious night, laying wide awake by the rich deepness of the vibrating, roaring snores of his roommate. He claimed the ordeal to be beyond any compare.
The day after, a sustained Southern wind of 43 miles per hour forced us to pack and return in the morning.
As a net result, I paddled for 180 minutes after dedicating 36 hours to the whole wretched business. I now consider taking solipsistic trips to destinations where alone and detached, I can find intensive paddling progress.
[Ignacio Wenley Palacios]
in Trips
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