Kayaking in the Bay

Setup complete (in less than 15 minutes)

My sister was kind enough to bring down a pair of Oru kayaks to Chick Weekend.  I've written about these before - they're these neat origami kayaks that fold into the size of a large suitcase and weigh under 30 lbs.  She had the two of these stuffed in her hatchback with the back seats pulled down.

We have paddled around the Quaboag River and Pond, but I had not been in any kayak out in Cape Cod Bay before.  So this was new.  There was a good breeze on our first day and the water wasn't too choppy.  We headed north towards Wellfleet.

Heading towards shore after being "caught" by the fisherman

We made it as far as Sunken Meadow beach.  At that point my sister was hooked by a fisherman who had cast his line further out than we expected.  She felt an initial tug, then thought it didn't stick.  But a few seconds later we heard a sharp whistle from shore and he yelled to us "you're caught on my line!"  As we paddled towards shore it somehow became disentangled.  I joked she was his biggest catch of the day.  He was really cool about it and warned us his lines went as far as a buoy several yards beyond where we had been.  We made sure to return on the far side of the buoy.

Campground Beach
(Can I just say how difficult it is to fumble with a camera and stay in the right direction at the same time?)

I would have loved to have made it around the bend of Sunken Meadow, but the wind and the waves were too much work and we turned back south.  It was a marvelous return trip; we did almost nothing but steer.  The wind and the waves brought us most of the way home little paddling.  At one point we scattered a flight of cormorants that were swimming in front of us.  They had to take off and fly directly over us, since we had the wind on our backs.  You don't expect birds to fly towards you when they want to get away.  One was clever and ducked under to swim away from us out toward the bay.

We managed a short trip the next morning heading south past Thumpertown beach.  It meant returning home into the wind, but it wasn't nearly as blustery as the previous day.

The rest of the gals had seen kayaks all folded in the car, but not how the assembled kayaks looked.  We gave them a demo on Sunday afternoon on how they unfolded as we washed out the sand and salt.

Disappointingly, one of the seam trims snapped on the kayak I used.  It's only four years old and has been well cared for.  I've been considering getting one of these, but they aren't cheap.  However - their support is wonderful.  I emailed Oru with a photo of the snapped piece and they responded minutes later to send a free replacement part (they're slow on getting it out for delivery, but I see the tracking number).  Obviously a common issue; how nice to have such great service.

It was a fun addition to the weekend.  I definitely want to try kayaking in the bay again.