It was another beautiful sunny day today, the sea was flat and everything felt still. We said goodbye to our new friends, Smu and Betty, and got onto the water. We aimed to paddle to Sooke, to set us up to arrive in Victoria on the 12th here in Canada.
It was nice to have no swell, it meant we were able to explore the coast and go into little caves and under waterfalls. It was so nice and sunny I decided to dry my damp paddling clothes out, I took off my spray skirt and sat up on the back of my boat. I was just about to call out to Ngaio when I lost my balance and before I knew it I was off my boat and into the big blue! Ngaio turned around and couldn’t quite believe her eyes, me flopping over my kayak trying to hold onto my boat and get my paddle. She got my paddle and I climbed back into my boat, I was very wet and had a bit of a bruised ego but it was definitely my own fault. Classic Brando, forgets to consider the consequences of his actions...
Once I had finished goofing around we continued down the coast, slowly getting closer to civilisation. Ngaios got one very stiff shoulder that was bugging her today, she had to keep stopping and stretching it. I’m hoping it’s just sore from overuse and it’s not an injury.
We came to a big harbour where there were so many porpoises. They were all around our boats, the harbour was alive with the sound of them breathing, it was awesome! We were blissed out watching the little porpoises when the sound of a fully automatic cannon went off. I could feel it vibrate through my chest and it boomed around the harbour. Ngaio and I looked at each other trying to figure out what was going on, the shooting didn’t stop for a long time. Eventually I was able to spot two naval war ships, it seemed as though they were shooting in a militarised zone. That was a harsh way to be bought back to reality.
We started seeing houses on the cliffs and eventually we were paddling past a full on town. We had to find a place to land that wasn’t going to be on someone’s land or too close to the town. The sun was getting lower in the sky and we couldn’t find anywhere. We were in a spot where there were mainly cliffs, and any small beaches had stairs leading to them from the surrounding houses. Our back up plan was a little island, we needed to get off the water before it was dark so we paddled to the small rocky island.
It was so hard to carry to boats up the rocks, they were fully loaded and heavy, and the terrain wasn’t exactly ideal. We managed to heave both the boats up onto the island then set up camp just as the sun was setting. We can’t wait to make it to Victoria tomorrow, it will feel like such a huge milestone for this trip. Then we get to meet up with some friends and head up the east coast!
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(If the Brando and Ngaio Icon does not show up on the map click the menu then participant list then 'show all')
(first image and blog via satellite phone)