Some Greenland Kayaking Advice

Having visited Greenland on a number of occasions and paddled close to 1,500 nautical miles along the west coast, there are a few bits of pertinent information, which I have picked up along the way and might prove useful to anybody contemplating a visit to these northern waters.

Food

Buy all of your food when you arrive.  It is a waste of time and money shipping food.  Even the smallest villages have a shop where you are able to buy anything from cream cheese to a sewing machine.

Shop in Saqqaq, northern Disko Bay.

Mosquito Net

Take a spare in case you mis-place your first one.  Have it ready to put on as soon as you get off the water.  You may not need it but like a good Boy Scout be prepared.  Remember to remove it when cooking in case the stove flares up, the molten material could make a real mess of somebodies face.

Some people use a complete bug suit, not just a head net.

Tipi

Although it can be a bit of a pain to carry they are a great piece of group equipment.  Perfect for those rare days when the weather isn't good enough to sit outside and ideal for providing some relief when the insects are particularly troublesome.  You can end up spending a significant amount of money on a tipi but I bought a cheaper version in 2009 and it is still going strong.  It can have a significant impact on your luggage allowance so I have left mine in Ilulissat, ready for my next visit.

 

Pressure Cooker

Perfect for helping with fuel economy, bring the rice to the boil and then take it off the flame for between 8 and 10 minutes.  The rice will be cooked to perfection.  They are Ideal for most meals.  It takes a bit of searching to find one with small enough handles that it goes into a kayak hatch, we eventually found a suitable one in a back street in Istanbul.

 

 Nets off when cooking

 Granite slabs

Look for the those slabs which have been scoured by the ice, close to the waters edge.  They are perfect at lunch time for relaxing on and hopefully there will be no standing water nearby, which will reduce the insect menace.

Learning to relax on granite slabs is an essential skill for paddling in the Arctic.

Down jacket

The absolute essential item of dry land equipment.  Don't leave home without one.

 

Relaxing after a good days paddle along the Vaigat

Campsites

Don't always paddle to the rear of the bay.  Think about collecting  plenty of water during the course of the day and camp on a low headland.  The location may be more exposed to wind, which will keep the insects down and the views are likely to be far more spectacular.  This was something which Greenlanders have known about for hundreds of years because quite a few of the low headlands we stopped at had indications of previous habitation.

 

A memorable campsite just the north of the abandoned village of Agpat.  There was no standing water nearby and we had a relatively insect free evening.

Disko Bay - Day 1

Last year the Jersey Canoe Club ran its 11th Sea Kayak Symposium, which generated some funds for the development of paddle sport.  It was decided to purchase a number of sea kayaks and place them on the west coast of Greenland, which is truly one of the great places to go paddling.

The kayaks were used for the first time by a Breton group at the beginning of July, read Peter's blog of some of his experiences in Greenland, and then we flew out to start our 18 day journey.  Its very easy to tun out of superlatives when describing the kayaking in Greenland, but hopefully the photographs give a sense of what its like.

Ilulissat Ice fjord, the most productive glacier in the northern hemisphere lies at the head of this fjord.  Anybody visit Ilulissat, the tourist capital of Greenland should walk to the edge of town to view one of the wonders of the natural world.

Looking north across Disko Bay.  Our route was heading through all that ice, this was my sixth trip in Greenland but I had never seen this much ice before.  Luckily some of the ice dispersed overnight so the initial part of the journey was slightly easier than we anticipated.  A French group of paddlers leaving a few days after us, took 2 days to get away from Ilulissat because of the ice.

 Alex threading his way through some of the smaller pieces of ice.  The hanging draw is one of the most useful strokes to master in this type of environment.

Generally when kayaking the ice the water is pretty smooth.  If the wind does pick up and the ice starts to move then a much more challenging situation develops and it is essential to avoid getting trapped by the ice.

 

 Nicky passing the small village of Rodebay.  In 15 days time we will be back to eat at one of my favourite restaurants to be found anywhere, the H8.  Today though we just wanted to press on north to reach the slabs at Anoritoq, where we knew there was a good campsite.

 There were some bigger bergs around and as general rule you need to keep away from them or if you were forced to pass close by be ready to paddle flat out.

Toby is not as close at it looks, the use of a telephoto lens can completely change the perspective.

 Ice bergs and blue skies eat the memory, of the camera, faster than almost anything else.  As we came towards the end of our first day on the water little did we realize that we wouldn't have a day this warm for the rest of the trip.

 Arriving close to our first nights camp.  The glacial scoured slabs make a great place to camp.  Easy to exit from the kayaks and lift them up above the high water mark and hopefully less bugs because of the reduced amount of standing water.  Also perfect for sitting on and sipping an after paddle Pernod.

 Toby was the youngest member of the group and the person who swam the most, I am not sure the two facts are related.  The sea temperature is barely above freezing.  A memorable end to the first day.

Portelet Pizza

For a number of years the old beach cafe at Portelet gradually crumbled through disuse, it's decline seemingly linked to the closure of the holiday camp, which used to dominate the cliff top above and the associated drop in the number of visitors to the beach.

This year has seen the refurbishment of the building and its reopening as a pizza place and the Jersey Canoe Club decided to visit the Portelet Bay Cafe for lunch on the last day of August.  A paddle from Ouaisne allowed us to visit some of the historical sites, which exist along this section of coast.

This was followed by a very pleasant break at Portelet Bay Cafe, the pizzas are highly recommended, and the paddle back assisting with their digestion.  Considering it was a rather grey day with an increasing north westerly wind we think we made pretty good use of the time.

 Leaving from Ouaisne is always fascinating as we pass close to La Cotte de St Brelade, which is one of the most important neanderthal sites in north west Europe.  Within the ice age sediments there are thousands of stone tools in addition to the bones of their prey.

 To the south lies the small stack of La Cotte Island, which has a number of short climbs on its west face.

 The first major headland is Pt Le Fret.  It is fully exposed to the Atlantic swell but today it was all calm and we able to thread our way through the gullies.  Earlier this year the swell so large that we had to keep about 200 metres out, when rounding the point.

 Noirmont Tower was completed in 1814 to help protect the southern coast of the island from potential invasion by the French.  Today the lighthouse marks the western approach to St Helier.

 Nicky passing in front of Batterie Lothringen, part of a World War 2 coastal battery.  The first part was completed in 1941 but this tower was built April and October 1943.

 On the beach at Portelet, after our pizza's.  Today was a particularly large spring tide, when we had landed less than 2 hours before, we left our kayaks at the waters edge.

 Another Jersey round tower, it was completed 6 years earlier than the nearby one at Noirmont, in 1806.  A sergeant and 12 soldiers manned the tower, it must have been rather crowded.

Les Dirouilles

To the north east of Jersey there are two reefs, Les Ecrehous and Les Dirouilles.  Without doubt the most popular area of this Ramsar site is Les Ecrehous but today our destination was Les Dirouilles.  

It was a large Spring Tide and although the tidal streams were running with significant energy we were able to use some of the speed to our advantage.  It was at times like this that confidence in the GPS is important, monitoring our drift and fine tuning of our bearing ensured that we weren't swept past the rocks.

Very little has been written about the reef but it is known that in 1816 40 people were drowned when a ship, La Balance, which was sailing from St Malo to Canada struck the reef.  It must have been in totally different conditions to those we experienced on the reef today.

The calm waters, fast moving streams and lack of any other people combined to produce a truly memorable day.

 Approaching Les Dirouilles.  When we left Jersey the tidal streams were running at over 4 knots, fortunately they were mainly in our favour.

 Pete is just visible threading his way through one of the numerous channels.

 Janet with a rather large smile, after a superb crossing from Jersey.

 Landing wasn't straightforward but it was a great place to swim.

 A very sheltered pool!  There can't be many days like this at Les Dirouilles.

 Looking north across the reef.  Next stop Alderney, about 30 miles away.

Although we were on the reef for only about an hour, the tide had dropped over a metre, and this wasn't at the time of maximum change.  The tidal range today was 11 metres.

Time to hitch a ride on the flooding tide back to St Catherine's.  At times our speed over the ground was over 7 knots.  The joy of a free ride!

Paternosters Again

It has been a while so I posted on the site, the aim of a photograph everyday, went out the window due to changing personal circumstances, but it is probably an opportune time to start to post again.

Today's paddle was to the Paternosters, a reef off the north west coast of Jersey, which is rarely visited by by other boat owners, as landing would be almost impossible.
On today's large spring tide there was a significant amount of exposed rock but Tuesday mornings tide is another 0.6 metre lower, with an 03:27 low water,  I think its true to say though nobody will be on the reef to witness it how much more is exposed.

For us though, it was a great couple of hours on the water.

Nicky arriving at the Paternosters.  Heading west from Bonne Nuit we made full use of the ebbing spring tide, most of the time we were averaging about 6 knots.

 Looking back towards the north west corner of Jersey.  Standing here is probably one of the most isolated locations in the Baliwick of Jersey

 A merry band of paddlers.  For a couple of the group it was their first visit to this reef off the north coast of Jersey.

 Looking north towards Sark, an excellent paddling destination in its own right.

 Leaving the reef towards the north coast of Jersey

This isn't an image to show that industry occurs around the coast of but rather the scene of environmental success.  In the sheds of the quarry a pair of chough's bred, for the first time in Jersey for approximately 100 years.  Sadly we didn't see them today.

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Paddling along the cliffs to the west of Xlendi, on Gozo.  Looking forward to exploring this coastline by sea kayak again, in 3 weeks time.

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A visit to St Catherine's to collect some kayaking equipment from the Jersey Canoe Club premises made me realize how few times I had ventured to the east of the Island so far this year.

The breakwater was part of a plan to build a significant naval harbour, work commenced in 1847 but had been abandoned by the mid-1850's.  Never seeing using as a naval harbour it was given to the States of Jersey in 1876.  Today is see's plenty use by a wide range of recreational activities such as fishing, sailing and kayaking.

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Quite a pleasant cycle ride today out to Corbiere, followed by a walk across the causeway.  This is the classic location for a picture, with the reflection in the rock pool unfortunately today the weather conditions weren't ideal from a photographic perspective.

The lighthouse was first lit on the 24th April 1874 and it was automated in 1974.  It cost £8,001 to build and is possibly the most photographed location on Jersey.  What I do know is that for the sea kayaker it is a truly iconc landmark.

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A quick walk along the cliffs of the south west of the Island this afternoon.  This section of coast is one of my favourites for coasteering but I have to admit that this afternoon the water didn't look that appealing.  

Hopefully though it won't be too long before we are swimming and jumping our way along the base of these cliffs.

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A rather pleasant Sunday morning out from St Brelade.  We headed around to Noirmont to play in the tide race formed on the ebbing tide.  Conditions were made more interesting due to the rather large swell running in from the west.  Just offshore it was probably peaking in the region of 8 feet with a swell period of about 14 seconds.

Derek is taking quite a wide route around Point Le Fret, to avoid the breaks in the region of the reefs.  A good way to spend a Sunday morning.

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On a day when the temperature reached 15 degrees, we headed from St Catherines along the north coast as far as Egypt, where the Canoe Club has a small cottage.  Here we are approaching the headland just to the east of Rozel, with the aptly named teddy bear rock clearly visible on the right.

A great day on the water with hopefully many more to follow in the coming weeks and months.

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I was going to post a picture of St Ouen's Bay this evening, looking great in the late evening sunshine until I came across the news that Audrey Sutherland, author of "Paddling Hawaii" and "Paddling My Own Canoe" had sadly passed away on the 23rd February at the age of 93.

She embarked on wilderness journeys starting in 1962, when she swam along the northern shore of   Molokai.  She moved up market a few years later when she started to explore the coasts of Hawaii,  British Columbia and Alaska in a small inflatable kayak.  Paddling thousands of miles on exploratory journeys.  Her most recent book, describing her travels in Alaska is "Paddling North".

She was a truly amazing paddler, pushing the boundaries of exploratory kayaking, defining the limits of what is possible with a minimum of equipment but a major sense of adventure.

As sea kayakers we often dream of where we would like to paddle but Audrey was living proof of what was possible if you had the vision and the enthusiasm.

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A day of superb weather was followed by a night on the water.  I have been running an Open Water Navigation and Tidal Planning Course over the last couple of weeks  so this evening rather than another classroom session we decided to put the theory into practice and spend a couple of hours plotting a course around the navigation poles close to St Aubin's.

We are just getting ready to launch from Belcroute.

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Beautiful day at St Brelades.  Plenty of people on the beach, with small surf rolling in at low water.

St Brelade's Church is probably in the finest location of any of the Islands churches and has been serving the local community for over a thousand years.

With lighter winds and rising temperatures there is the likelihood of some good sea kayaking over the next few days.

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Bot the most inspiring photograph but behind this pile of vegetation lies a story.  This is hottentot fig, which is a highly invasive plant species introduced into gardens in Jersey from South Africa, in about the middle of the 19th Century.  The plant spreads and regenerates very quickly smothering the native vegetation along large sections of the south west coast.  A consequence is that it destroys the habitat of a number of native spevies such as the Green Lizard and the Dartford Warbler.

The only effective means of getting rid of the plant is to pull it out by hand, which is obviously time consuming and then ideally it is burnt.  At the moment I am working with a couple of local primary schools, with the children working towards their John Muir Award, a nationally recognized environmental award.  Over the next few weeks we will be exploring this area in some detail including removing some hottentot fig, this was today's contribution.

Very satisfying and showing that people can make a difference.

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Great view of a squall approaching St Ouen's around lunch time today.  Surprisingly where we were standing there wasn't much rain but the winds did gust up to about 55 knots.  It has been a day of fast changing weather but optimistically as the weekend approaches things are looking like they will calm down and warm up.  Could even be an Ecrehous day on Saturday, fingers crossed.

Belcroute Kayaking again - Daily Picture 59

It was another Sunday morning with strong westerly winds forecast so the options for our weekly paddle were limited.  It was another visit to Belcroute, which is sheltered from the strong winds from the west.  The winds on the day didn't appear to be quite as strong as forecast so we were able to head across St Aubin's Bay towards Elizabeth Castle, using the wind for quite an entertaining ride.

One advantage of living on an island is that whatever the wind direction it is always possible to find somewhere to paddle and as result of this the Jersey Canoe Club has managed to get on the water, on a Sunday morning pretty much every week since the mid-1970's.

Jason preparing to launch at Belcroute, sheltered from the strong westerly wind which was blowing at the time.

 Looking back up the beach at Belcroute.  With winds like those forecast for this morning the kayaking options were limited.  The Jersey Canoe Club were not the only group paddling from there today.  The faster group who paddle Taran's had also chosen this location to leave from.

Pete just before Noirmont.  The relatively calm seas don't indicate the true wind speed as we were sheltered by Noirmont headland.

Crossing St Aubin's Bay.  The further we moved away from Noirmont the greater the impact of the wind.

 Elizabeth Castle lies ahead.  One of the finest military fortifications of Jesrey.

 You don't see too many of these navigation marks around, an Isolated Danger Mark, just to the south of West Park Pool.