The club's day outing on the 7th Sept was to the
Hamble river and I jumped at the chance to get a bit of experience on a tidal
flow where the river empties into Southhampton water. Seven of us drove
down to Swanwick which is about half way up the Hamble and put into the water at
the public access 'hard' which is almost, but not quite, above the main mooring
area of the estuary. We had to paddle about a mile upriver and past the M27
bridge before getting into the countryside.
The flow that was assisting us upstream had a few surprises as we negotiated the lines of moored boats which eddied around causing cross currents that took one or two of us by surprise, despite the warnings from our leader. In my case the current was causing me to drift sideways towards a rather expensive looking 'gin palace' and it took some hard paddling to get clear of the side of the boat and back to the middle of the channel.
Nevertheless we were soon above the mooring area and pushed on steadily upstream. Eventually we ended up at a fork in the river and went left to explore that channel as the pre-arranged plan. After about a mile the channel closed in on us and the depth of water made navigation difficult until a low arched bridge effectively cut off further progress and forced us to about turn and retrace our steps.
We returned to the fork in the river and took the right hand channel a shot way up to a pub and landed at high tide to partake of a light lunch. After an hour we had to leave to take advantage of the ebbing tide for the return journey. Up to this point everything had gone quite well with the weather having been warm and pleasant. The only presage of any change had been at the river's fork when a gusty breeze had sprung up across the channel.
On returning to the river's fork we found that the breeze had now strengthened and was blowing at an angle across the river making me at least a feel quite unstable. At length I had to paddle away from the straight line down river to get the wind coming directly at me which was the only way I could feel stable. Although the current was assisting our passage, the wind was definitely not, and it was a hard push against the now gusting wind to keep up a steady progress. All this was taking a bit of a toll on the less experienced members of the group which was now getting a bit strung out, but for a large part of the return myself and two others led the way in single file while two weaker paddlers followed accompanied by the two most experienced paddlers who were handling the conditions easily.
I'm happy to say that for once I wasn't the weakest paddler and was keeping my end up on the front three while the more experienced paddlers supported those at the rear. As the river widened, conditions became more exposed and the wind was now whipping up small wavelets to about a foot in height and it came to a point where we had to run crosswind to follow the channel back under the M27 bridge and into the mooring basin area. This became quite hair raising we traversed cross wind and wave until we reached the first line of moored boats which afforded some slight respite from the conditions.
At last we made it back to the 'hard' without any capsizes but the wind threw one last curved ball at me in it's efforts to get me to swim. I was standing off from the jetty, gently back peddling, while a couple of the others took their time to get themselves and their boats out of the water' just a bit too long for me as the wind was strengthening even more and gusted up to push me towards a concrete harbour wall and a breakwater. I know I should have just back paddled out to hold station while I waited for the others to get clear of the landing, but instead tried to turn in a now very confined space, and found myself crosswind and rapidly being blown sideways against the wall.
I was soon all over the place trying just to not fall in. I succeeded eventually in getting over to the get-out point which had at last been vacated, and not very elegantly parked up with the assistance of one of the club elders who grabbed the end of my paddle and pulled me in.
So, it ended without getting wet, if not with quite in the fashionable fineness I would have liked. It was a good day out with another nine miles to the total. But the best aspect of it was that I handled it!! It was a great confidence boost and there wasn't anything about this trip that I think could have been worse on the Thames home ground. Neither was I the slowest paddler, which I was afraid I might be. It really feels like a significant step forward at last.
The flow that was assisting us upstream had a few surprises as we negotiated the lines of moored boats which eddied around causing cross currents that took one or two of us by surprise, despite the warnings from our leader. In my case the current was causing me to drift sideways towards a rather expensive looking 'gin palace' and it took some hard paddling to get clear of the side of the boat and back to the middle of the channel.
Nevertheless we were soon above the mooring area and pushed on steadily upstream. Eventually we ended up at a fork in the river and went left to explore that channel as the pre-arranged plan. After about a mile the channel closed in on us and the depth of water made navigation difficult until a low arched bridge effectively cut off further progress and forced us to about turn and retrace our steps.
We returned to the fork in the river and took the right hand channel a shot way up to a pub and landed at high tide to partake of a light lunch. After an hour we had to leave to take advantage of the ebbing tide for the return journey. Up to this point everything had gone quite well with the weather having been warm and pleasant. The only presage of any change had been at the river's fork when a gusty breeze had sprung up across the channel.
On returning to the river's fork we found that the breeze had now strengthened and was blowing at an angle across the river making me at least a feel quite unstable. At length I had to paddle away from the straight line down river to get the wind coming directly at me which was the only way I could feel stable. Although the current was assisting our passage, the wind was definitely not, and it was a hard push against the now gusting wind to keep up a steady progress. All this was taking a bit of a toll on the less experienced members of the group which was now getting a bit strung out, but for a large part of the return myself and two others led the way in single file while two weaker paddlers followed accompanied by the two most experienced paddlers who were handling the conditions easily.
I'm happy to say that for once I wasn't the weakest paddler and was keeping my end up on the front three while the more experienced paddlers supported those at the rear. As the river widened, conditions became more exposed and the wind was now whipping up small wavelets to about a foot in height and it came to a point where we had to run crosswind to follow the channel back under the M27 bridge and into the mooring basin area. This became quite hair raising we traversed cross wind and wave until we reached the first line of moored boats which afforded some slight respite from the conditions.
At last we made it back to the 'hard' without any capsizes but the wind threw one last curved ball at me in it's efforts to get me to swim. I was standing off from the jetty, gently back peddling, while a couple of the others took their time to get themselves and their boats out of the water' just a bit too long for me as the wind was strengthening even more and gusted up to push me towards a concrete harbour wall and a breakwater. I know I should have just back paddled out to hold station while I waited for the others to get clear of the landing, but instead tried to turn in a now very confined space, and found myself crosswind and rapidly being blown sideways against the wall.
I was soon all over the place trying just to not fall in. I succeeded eventually in getting over to the get-out point which had at last been vacated, and not very elegantly parked up with the assistance of one of the club elders who grabbed the end of my paddle and pulled me in.
So, it ended without getting wet, if not with quite in the fashionable fineness I would have liked. It was a good day out with another nine miles to the total. But the best aspect of it was that I handled it!! It was a great confidence boost and there wasn't anything about this trip that I think could have been worse on the Thames home ground. Neither was I the slowest paddler, which I was afraid I might be. It really feels like a significant step forward at last.
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