BCU 3 Star Sea Kayak Assessment

Today was the big day. After all that training and paddling I moved on to the assessment to see if I was able to paddle at a 3 star sea kayak level. Today was actually fairly calm compared to the last two days. We actually had to go out of our way to find conditions that would meet with the minimum requirements. We ended up doing a lot of rock gardens. In Maine, with the high tidal difference, there didn't really seem to be many beaches and more there were rocky outcroppings and cliff faces. With the ocean swells we worked our way in as close to the rocky walls as possible even moving through some of the rocky gaps as the swells would allow. It was quite a bit of fun. I had never had a chance to go rock gardening as there are none down here that I am aware of. With the swells moving in, the boats would get pushed close to the rocks and as the swell receded, we would move away. This turned out to be an excellent time to really work on doing hanging draws. A hanging draw is a static stroke taken to help move the kayak sideways while on the move. It really is a very cool stroke when mastered. I feel I have mastered it both in forward and reverse.

Today I was the only girl moving forward into the assessment. We were a group of 6 people with 3 of us having gone through the training together. It was nice to move into the assessment as a group and know we were in it together. For the most part we all did well. At one point, just to make things more challenging, I was asked to trade boats with someone who also had a Force 4. The catch was we were not allowed to get wet. Since the other guy was a little shaky on his skills, I ended up taking over. I grabbed another kayaker to help and we rafted up creating a nice stable platform allowing me to get out of my boat and him to get in before I crawled over all three boats and hopped into his. It was a pretty cool feat to do on a dynamic surface. His outfitting was a little odd with a higher seat. A few minutes later we traded back in a similar manner on as part of a tow.

Towards the end of the day, we were goofing off and playing in the rock gardens again. I went through a small gap in the rocks with no problems. The next guy through also had no problems. When I turned around to go back, the water lifted me up, turned me then drained out leaving my bow and stern up on the rocks while I was hanging head down in the water. I ended up having to exit the boat and came up laughing. I had just been part of a controlled rescue a few minutes ago and had just warmed up then here I was back in the water trying to push my boat off the rocks for another rescue. Everyone thought it was funny too, I am just sad that no one managed to get a picture.

After all was done, we got back to Bar Harbor safely and exhausted. We opted to get our assessment as a group and 5 of us passed. We later found out that the one guy who didn't pass, had known ahead of time that he likely wouldn't and wanted to come for the training and practice. He realized after seeing us paddle that he really did need more work to get up to that skill level. The rest of us went back to the symposium site and partied a bit to celebrate. My individual comments were that I needed to pay more attention to surroundings when doing rescues (or at least designate a looker), and try to keep myself tucked in more to prevent shoulder injuries. The one piece of praise I received which was the same as yesterday was that my finesse strokes are beautiful and well done, but the strength strokes require a bit more work with timing.

I ended up going out for supper that night with a bunch of the instructors who were still in town one more night. I knew two of the instructors from before, Alison Sigethy and Kevin Black, and had kayaked with Russell Farrow at the Mid-Atlantic Kayak Festival as well as saw his talk both at MAKF and ECCKF in the spring so it was cool to actually talk with him. I hadn't met Any Sparks before but he was pretty cool to kayak with and I feel I learned a lot with him over the two day training. The people who run the Carpe Diem Symposium, Mel and Mark, are great people and I hope I can get out there again next time. They let me shower in the bunkhouse. Nothing like a hot shower to feel human again. I hate campgrounds that have coin-operated showers.

BCU 3 Star Training, Day 2

After a very intense day one training I think we were all expecting another heavy day of training. Today wasn't nearly as intense but we did still go over a lot of drills. This time we were able to focus a little more on navigation as we ran into some fog that lingered into the late morning. Navigation is an interesting challenge on the water.

First, it is hard to plan a bearing and course on the fly because looking down onto a map is a really great way to wind up sea sick and sometimes even dizzy. There are devices, like the Nav-aid that are supposed to make it easier to get a bearing quickly so as to spend less time looking down. I don't have one. I think some preplanning and rafting of boats together went a long way to getting a bearing quickly and relatively accurately. Having the chart folded out to show the interested areas also helps.

Second, once we managed to plan out our route (straight line across a channel), we found that we hadn't taken the current into account. Our destination was the lower point of a small island. In order to make sure we didn't miss the island altogether, we aimed for the center of the island. This makes it easier to correctly reach our destination. The problem was we didn't account for the current in the channel, which was actually moving quite quickly and we ended up getting pushed quite badly. If the fog had been thicker, we would not have seen the island materializing in front of us. With the current in the channel, it would have been quite possible for us to be pushed right past the other end of the island. As it was, the fog was lifting as we made our way across the channel and I could see how skewed our course had become. We corrected on the fly as we could start to see where we were going.

Lunch was a much more relaxing affair, at first. We landed on a small fishing island and enjoyed a nice lunch. We did have some fun trying to land on the extra high docks. The instructor chose the slightly lower dock and I opted to go that route too. I had some trouble levering myself up off the boat to a standing position. My knees just didn't seem to have enough strength to get me up from a seated position. Once I managed to get my butt up onto my back deck I had an easier time of it. We basically got out, walked the boats to the other side then hopped back in. The lunch spot was a rocky beach and nicely enough a picnic table. We did have to determine our precise coordinates for an "emergency" call. Our coordinates right down to the decimal seconds. Luckily we had a good chart to read off of. And at least one person who knew were to find the decimal second readings.

This day seemed to focus more on paddling as a whole, we did work on some skills and some rescues but I feel like we actually went somewhere today rather then paddling in small circles. The small circles were nice yesterday and I like the fact that each day was entirely different while still covering about the same material. I'm just glad I didn't have to tow as the tows were for long distances not quick little tows. Although that is likely a great way to get in shape.

BCU 3 Star Training, Day 1

I wasn't sure what to expect on my first day of training for the 3 Star Sea Kayak Award. I had read that conditions needed to be at about 10-15 knots of wind, 3-5 foot seas and at least a couple of knots of current. So in my mind, I was picturing big waves, big winds AND big current. My imagination got the better of me and worked me up into a worried state. Turns out it should be at least one of those conditions and not necessarily all those conditions. Once out on the water, I realized the conditions really were not so bad. In fact I didn't think them bad at all, which is a good thing. This means I was ready for this type of water and comfortable with it. I did figure out I wasn't in very good shape in spite of all the whitewater paddling I have been doing. Time to start working on attaining so get in shape.

I already have a membership for my whitewater L3 certification and an L3 personal achievement award through the ACA, the American Canoe Association. I wasn't sure why I wanted to get another membership and personal achievement award in the BCU system (British Canoe Union). After looking at the levels of the two systems, I realized that there are advantages to training in both systems. The ACA L3 is not quite equivalent to the 3 Star. In fact the 3 Star is a bit of a step up and is a great stepping stone in bettering myself. This way it looks like I can take smaller steps and bounce between the two systems. I had not taken any ACA training with my L3 assessment, rather I got the 3 Star training but with no conditions. My understanding is that the BCU system is focusing on the journey and leadership where the ACA system focuses on the skills to do the trip.

We started out with a foggy and overcast day. Temperatures were not too bad but the water was definitely on the colder side of things. I had chosen to wear my light-weight wool thermals over my mid-weight wool thermals. I had an extra top layer just in case. We started off with a very long and winding back paddle through the ships and various ship buoys littering the harbor. I thought my arms were going to fall off. I don't think I have ever paddled that far backwards before, ever! Definitely worked out some muscles. We moved on through the morning, paddling around to the various small islands, landing on one and "saving" our paddle from hypothermia. Of course it is a good idea to save someone above the high water line. I didn't realize we didn't have to actually open up the space blanket, those things are like a can of worms. Once I got it out of the bag, it expanded beyond belief. I ended up shoving it into my dry bag to fold up later.

We had a working lunch. There were so many things to go over from navigation, to tides, then strokes and concepts. We worked on some navigation and tide work over lunch as time seemed to be in short supply. After lunch we took some time to surf the wave that forms over the little rock shelf. This was lots of fun. I hadn't had a chance to surf in quite a while. I had some control over my boat but I could still tell the wave was pushing me along to surfer's left. Not a good place to be as it was shallow there. One guy managed to do a bow stall with his 18 foot sea kayak, quite impressive. We also had a bit of a traffic jam, one boat plowing over another.

In the afternoon we worked on rescues and boat repair. I found out that my light-weight wool thermals were not going to keep me warm for prolonged sitting or immersion. Good thing for the borrowed dry suit but damn it was cold. Various rescues then on to boat repair. My partner for the training got out of his boat and sat on my deck while we pulled his boat up between us and tried to "repair" it. We found that the Gorilla Tape he had didn't stick to it, neither did the Hippo Tape I had. I found out afterwards that the Hippo Tape really needs to be applied to a dry surface. I might have to try it again some other time. In the meantime, we found out that Duct Tape seemed to be the winner. Window flashing is also supposed to be a great item which I have seen in use before and really should go out and buy.

We were supposed to be on the water until about 4:30. Our trainer asked if we were okay with staying out later. For extra training we were happy to but we were getting tired. I finally asked if this was a two day class or if I was mistaken. He thought I meant is this normally a two day class to which his response was that this could take up to six months in England. I restated that I meant this weekend, and after a show of (tired) hands, we headed back. He was a little apologetic yet happy to keep working on us tomorrow. So we headed back exhausted but feeling good. Almost all of us were signed up for the class tomorrow and only a small few were signed for the assessment on the Monday.

Coastal Navigation and Tidal Planning

In an effort to continue my training and increase my abilities, I registered for a symposium in Maine with the hopes of getting more on the water experience and learn how to better handle myself, my boat and deal with tides, and navigation. When I saw the Coastal Navigation and Tidal Planning course listed on the curriculum I thought I had found the perfect class. The class is part of the new BCU 4 Star Sea Kayak Leader Award. Although I was not yet heading towards that award level, I thought it would still come in handy. I was more then a little surprised and slightly disappointed to discover (after showing up) that the class was not an on water class. It was actually a classroom class. But it was still well worth it. I feel that I got a lot out of the class and I just have to remember how to use what I learned. The class was broken down into four major topics.

Tides
We learned about tides and the various types. There are spring tides which are the biggest and neap tides which are the smallest. Spring tides occur when the moon and sun line up, so basically at new moon and full moon. Neap tides occur when the moon is halfway through waxing or waning. Spring tides can be affected even more in the spring when the earth is closer to the sun causing an even stronger gravitational pull. Tides are caused by the water sliding across the surface of the earth. Water is not lifted, it is moved. Based on the continental shelf, tides may be only a few feet in height or they may be tens of feet in height. Charts with depths marked show lowest mean depth. As this is a mean average, it is possible to have a negative tidal difference. Recently, the UK switched over to lowest astronomical depth meaning that when everything is in alignment, that is the lowest possible depth. While it is still possible for a negative tide, the tidal difference is almost trivial.

The period of the tide is just over 6 hours from low to high or high to low. The moon travels around the earth in the same direction that the earth is spinning. The moon has a 28 day orbit. Over the 24 hour rotation of the earth, the moon has moved 1/28th of an orbit. So the earth is constantly playing catch up with the moon. This causes the tides to slowly move forward each day.

Wind and Waves
Wind causes waves but where does the wind come from? Wind is caused by changing temperatures in the air. The air near the equator heats up and rises heading towards the cooler air at the poles. The cold air at the poles, moves down towards the equator to head up. This circular motion of air moves both on a grand scale and at smaller scales. As the air moves towards the poles, some of the air loses it heat and sinks back down to the equator causing smaller circular currents. All this is what happens in an ideal world. But once land is involved, air heats up faster over land during the day and cools off faster in the night. Water is a great temperature regulator. The air over land will shift with day and night causing on-shore and off-shore breezes. Add in the rotation of the earth and the wind now twists around.

Waves are formed by off-shore weather patterns. The wind from the weather patterns stirs up the water and the waves travel out from that point until they meet the shore. Waves can be generated miles away from the shore. There tends to be a period or pattern to the waves. While no two waves are the same, there is a period to the wave sets. Watching waves on shore, waves will start small, then build up to larger waves then decrease back down to small waves again. The breaking of waves occurs when the water has no where to go but up, generally caused by the beach shelf, sand bars, reefs and other obstacles on the ocean floor.

Currents
Just as air can be heated and moved, so to can water. The ocean is similarly heated at the equator and travels up to the poles in a great heat exchange. The continents provide some resistance as well as more water from rivers. As water flows between islands, stronger currents are formed as water is pinched and forced through narrower gaps. With the tide and movement of the water, there is various types of current. A slack current is when the tide is at its slowest, typically at the high or low portion of the tide, just before it changes direction. The current can ebb or flow, ebb meaning it is going out and flow meaning it is coming in. The fun part about currents is the cool things that are created that make for great play spots. Swells and waves moving along rocky shores are fun to paddle around and through. Swells moving over ledges create waves which can be surfed. Tidal races are standing waves formed when water moves through a constriction.

Weather
Weather affects the tides and even affects the tide height. With a high pressure system, the pressure of the air pushing down on the water causes the tide height to diminish. The opposite is true with a low pressure system, less pressure allows the tide to become higher. High pressure systems do not have fronts associated with them while low pressure systems do. The clashing of fronts causes weather changes either in the form of thunderstorms, or rain.

Navigation
This can be broken down into three sections; bearings, courses, and headings. Bearing are the straight line direction to any object whether you intend to travel there or not. Bearings can be used to triangulate a position in the ocean when several markers or land features can be seen. Headings are the direction of travel, whether that takes current and wind into account or not. Courses are the path actually taken, as in how the wind and current actually affected the path of travel. Bearings, courses, and headings can all be the same or they can all be different. Knowing how strong the current or wind is in a particular area can allow for compensation.

So much more
This is really only the barest amount that I learned from the class. There was so much more. It was a very good class and I found it useful. We actually walked down to the beach and took a few bearings and discussed how to triangulate and plan a trip. We learned how to read charts and obtain locations from a chart. Most charts are in both true north and magnetic north so we learned how to correct between the two. The rule of thumb was when going from the small world (chart or map) to the big world (real world) you add the deviation. When going from the real world to the small world, the deviation is subtracted. The compass rose has all the needed information about deviations and annual change.

Sea Kayaking

I haven't had many chances to get my sea kayak out onto the water and I feel pretty bad about that. I really need to improve my comfort level and ability in kayaking if I want to do such a huge paddle as I have planned. As such I was pleasantly surprised to discover that one of the outfitters in the area had a social paddle session that I could join. At the same time, since I wanted to go through the instructor training, I joined the group as an instructor helper. I will eventually be taking my training and certification with the same outfitter so this is a great way to improve my teaching ability as well as get my boat back on the water.

Teaching Flat Water
As I knew the instructor, it was fairly easy to join up and paddle with the group. I wasn't sure what to expect at the first paddle and thought I would be following around another instructor to watch and learn. What actually happened was I was given a few students to work with for rolling practice, then I was put on the spot to teach a small group of students how to do a sculling draw. The instructor who suggested I teach this stroke will also be my instructor for the certification. So it was time to put on the instructor face and paddle at the best level I could. By the end of the two hours, I was exhausted from teaching, and the double portage. But after talking with the instructor, it looks like I am on track to have at least an L3 certification to teach. I would like to see if I can get a higher level. If nothing else, going through the training will help me improve my abilities even if I don't get the certification.

On one of the next paddles I helped with, I was filmed. Mostly for some basic strokes to demonstrate ability. This is supposed to be a good teaching aide as well, but I dislike watching myself. I do manage to see what I am doing wrong though which does help. It seems each time I go out with this group I get put on the spot, which is nice. It challenges me to be on top of my game. It is interesting that the more I work with the instructor the more he tries to convince me to come work for them. He is trying to steal me away from the competition. I have been invited to join then on their saturday Potomac tours to show off the beauty of the Potomac to new paddlers. I wasn't able to go this time, but I should be able to go next time if I am not teaching.

Back on the Ocean
I was out with a small group on the weekend and finally managed to get my boat out on the Chesapeake Bay. While the pace was quite relaxed, it was nice to get back into proper torso rotation and even surfing a few waves. It was a very hot day though and I managed to get a fairly nasty burn on my shoulders. My kayak handled quite nicely and I can't wait to get it out again. I really do miss the feel of the boat, even though whitewater is fun for playing.

Maine Rough Water
In order to improve my abilities, I just registered for a rough water symposium that is set to occur the beginning of September in Maine. The symposium is over 4 days and it will take me two days to travel there and back. I am looking forward to it with a slight level of dread. I registered to go through the BCU 3 star sea training and assessment. This will be in rough water with big winds. I am not sure I am in shape enough for that but I guess I will find out shortly. I am also not sure about my abilities out on the ocean in rough water. I simply have not had any major opportunities to get out in such conditions recently. I have been doing a lot of whitewater kayaking which I hope will help my abilities. They do suggest that cross training in another discipline like whitewater or canoeing is a good idea.

MAKF Day 1

I was only registered in one class today. Although most of the classes were only half day classes, the BCU 3 Star training class was expected to be a full day in length. I wasn't sure if it was a good thing or a bad thing that not only did we not have the right conditions to play and learn in but there were only 3 people total in the class. Me and the other student did get really good one-on-one instruction in the class and while I felt I knew how to do many of the things he was teaching, it was nice to break a few habits and learn how to do the strokes correctly.

Problem areas
I have discovered that I simply do not do enough torso rotation. While I am flexible enough to rotate to the position I need to be in, I just don't do it. So I have to focus on correct torso rotation both in my forward stroke and in many of the side strokes.

Another area of contention was that I tend to keep a death grip on my paddle. I already knew this but forcing myself to relax both my hands will go a long way. Having someone constantly pointing it out to me also went a long way to. I am a little more relaxed in my grip.

Learning
It was a rather big day for learning some new things. I learned quite a few new maneuvers and relearned some others. I am a little nervous about my ability right now as I feel I am learning so much and tomorrow I registered to be tested on all these skills. In fact I am not tested on my ability to just do the skills, I will be tested on my ability to show I can consistently perform at a certain level. I am not sure I can perform at that level if I am just learning the strokes and concepts. Tomorrow will tell.

Wrap-up
The festival so far has been very relaxed and low-key. I have been having a lot of fun so far and can't wait for the weekend. There are few people here today and the classes are very small. I am really enjoying the personal attention and feel that this is going a long way to my learning these strokes and concepts correctly the first time that I learn them. The area that the festival is taking place in is a YMCA camp and the bunk houses are nice. They have been providing us all with food and the food has been very good too. I was a little leery of eating food so far off my diet so I opted to stick mostly with the vegetarian fare and I felt that would likely be the safest. So far so good on that front. The evening entertainment was a talk I had seen at the ECCKF about a month ago but it was really cool to see it again. I have been really psyched up for this big expedition trip and I really hope both of us are ready to go when the time comes.

I really wish Kayaker Boy had been able to join in on the festival too. I think he would have had a really good time. But alas he is about to start a new job and sadly couldn't make it.

Mid-Atlantic Kayak Festival

I just registered for the MAKF that is coming up in mid-May. I first heard about the festival at ECCKF when one of the organizers was doing some shameless self-promotion. I was talking to him about the ACA (American Canoe Association) and BCU (British Canoe Union) classes I wanted to take and he handed me a card promoting the festival. This looks like a great festival and not only is it in my back yard, but this is the first year it is happening and they managed to get some really big names in the kayaking world to come down and participate as instructors. I am looking into doing the ACA L3 assessment as well as the BCU 3 Star training and the 3 Star assessment. Seems a little boring to just do training classes and assessments but I really want to have my skills as good as possible before going out on an expedition trip. I am really exited that they are offering a class over the lunch hour that discusses expedition trip planning. I can't wait to go to that talk and hear what is really involved with what I want to do.

The festival is happening up near Annapolis in Maryland at the YMCA camp. I have never been there before but it seems like a good location as it will offer housing, food and the bay is only 2 miles away. Having the bay so close means that classes that require rough water conditions can just paddle out to the bay and have the conditions if they are present. This is a big if as when I registered, I was actually told they may not have the conditions so I opted to not go for the 3 Star assessment but I stayed with the training as I think it will be a good class to take.

After registering, my classes will include the BCU 3 Star training on Friday which is the whole day. On Saturday I will be doing the ACA L3 assessment in the morning followed by incident management in the afternoon. Sunday I will have advanced strokes on the bay in the morning and a nature paddle in the afternoon. I opted for the nature paddle at the end as I felt I would likely be exhausted and there didn't really seem to be anything that I was interested in taking. It seems there are few people signed up at this point and chances are I can move classes around if something comes up. As this is the first year this festival is occurring, the small class sizes will mean more personal teaching then would otherwise have occurred has the classes booked up solid.

The reason I wanted to get both an ACA and BCU assessment is that I felt if I were to travel around the world, which is actually on the list of things to do, that a BCU personal achievement award would be worth more then an ACA achievement award. I feel that since the BCU system has been around for longer that more people around the world have heard of this and will know what exactly it means. The ACA L3 is not equivalent to the BCU 3 Star as I found out when I was discussing this with the coordinator during registration. The L3 training and assessment will all take place on calm water and is more an assessment of skill and precision. The 3 Star training and assessment takes place on rough water with 2-3 foot following seas and about 15-20 knot winds. This is an assessment of skills in conditions and not so much precision. The BCU recently changed their system and the old BCU 3 Star was on calm water but now the new 3 Star is closer to the old 4 Star. I will eventually have to get out on rough waters and train up to get a 3 Star. There are other festivals and still tie to work on skills. My fingers are crossed that I will pass my L3 assessment.