02/24/09

This morning Thom and I had planned a kayak trip. I got up early and went over to his place at 6:15AM for breakfast. His wife, Cara, had made blueberry muffins for us which were very good. After we had finished, we went outside to get everything together. This time instead of just going out to paddle around, we decided to go to a lake that is a few miles away. We started off so early that there wasn't much wind at all and the ocean looked very calm. It looked as close to glass as the ocean probably gets. It was very easy to paddle along and we made good progress from the start.

After about a half hour of paddling, we got to a spot where we could see the bottom. We stopped and just looked down at the floor of the ocean. It was probably only around 12 feet deep or so, but very clear. We went a little further and it started to get deeper again. We stopped about ten minutes later and just looked around enjoying the quiet morning. As we were sitting there, I felt something bump the bottom of the kayak. I asked Thom if he felt it and he thought I had moved my feet. I said I didn't and we felt it again. He said he wasn't moving so something must have hit the bottom. It wasn't hard enough to rock the kayak, but definitely noticeable. I wouldn't suspect that it was a shark, but I don't know what it would have been. We didn't see anything either. About five minutes later a big fish jumped in front of us. I didn't see it come out of the water, but noticed a big splash in front of us.

We kept paddling on and finally got to the inlet where we could see a stream that lead to the lake. Kayaking through the stream was very interesting. Some parts were very shallow and then we would go around a bank that looked incredibly deep. I woudl imagine that it was over ten feet deep. The other strange thing was that we weren't surrounded by a solid bank of soil. To the right and left of us as we went through the winding stream were bush like plants that were growing straight out of the water. There were parts where we could see soil, but most places the bushes just grew right out of the water with their roots shooting downward. It was beautiful at the same time as it was a little creepy not knowing what was in the water or how deep it was.

We got to the opening and decided to cross the lake. Once we got to the other side, we got out and walked around. The bank that we decided to land on looked like a small beach. It wasn't at all. The shore was very muddy and the "beach" was dried mud. It was very light in color which made it look like a beach from across the lake. As we walked on it we noticed that it was sparkleing because of all the dried saltwater. I guess the water must rise when there is a high tide. When we arrived, the tide was coming in as the stream was going from the ocean to the lake. By the time we left, the water was still flowing in.

We didn't stick around for too long. I wanted to because there were some very cool cactus plants but we knew that we needed to leave because the wind was picking up. We put our life jackets back on and got ready to head out. I walked though the nearly black mud and jumped in the kayak. I didn't put my feet in though. I wanted to get far enough out so I could rinse my shoes off before putting them inside.

It didn't take us too long to get back across the lake back to the stream. On our way back, we anticipated the trip to take longer because this time we would be paddling against the current and wind. Once we got out of the channel we could see the waves had picked up and we weren't going to get back as easily as we got there. All in all, it is about five miles from where we started to the other end of the lake. Once we were back out of the lake, we had about three miles or so to go. The trip back took nearly twice as long; about two hours. It was a lot of fun and good to get some exercise on our second day off for the week.

Below is a picture from the trip: