Maine Island Trail - Day 2 - June 16th

My day started out later than I had hoped. I hadn't been able to fall asleep; the reality that this trip was actually happening finally hit at around 9:30 at night. It was definitely reflected in the time that I woke up. I was surprised at how sore I was from the day before. 12 miles hadn't seemed like much last night when I had too much energy to fall asleep, but it certainly felt like a lot this morning. Not exactly what you want when you're about to embark on a 25+ mile day.

After a quick breakfast of freeze dried eggs and bacon, I packed up camp and was on the water by 6:45. Taking advantage of the lack of wind and waves, I hurried (as much you can with a bost that all told weighs around 350 pounds) along the outer, more exposed route. I had heard bad things about rounding Cape Small, and wanted to get past there before the wind started in earnest. As I hoped, I made it to the coast of Cape Small around 11:30. After almost 4 hours and 13 miles straight, I decided to stop on a nice sand beach to take a break. About 20 minutes later I was back in the kayak heading around the point, thankfully without incident.

I was pretty lazy paddling up the coast from there, I had the wind at my back and I was moving faster than I expected. A pair of seals followed me for a short way, playing around the back of my boat. I was navigating my way around a few islands when shit hit the fan. The wind had picked up shifted around to the south east and I, not paying very close attention, had wandered directly into the mouth of the Kennebec River. What had looked like some medium sized whitecaps from a distance turned out to be some medium sized standing waves. I managed to ferry my way across the remarkably strong current and up to the point of the island where there was a small cove. This was when I discovered things were going to get a whole lot worse before they got better. On the other side of the point, right where I needed to cross, was another area of standing waves. Only these were much bigger waves over a much bigger area. I really only had two options: go back the way I came, through the waves I'd just fought, and around the southern end of the island OR try to paddle up against the current and ferry across ahead of the very unpleasant looking waves. I opted for the latter, because there was a distinct possibility that there would be more of the same on the south side anyways. Needless to say, my plan did not work. I began getting sucked back towards the waves almost immediately, and had to make a other unpleasant choice: do I keep trying to fight them and potentially be dragged in backwards, or go headfirst through them? I opted to go headfirst, so at least I could see the disaster as it was coming. And that was the moment I discovered that my kayak could do double duty as a submarine. The waves were tall enough that I couldn't see over them, and my boat was almost constantly completely covered by two waves; one on the stern and one on the bow, pushing it down. I made it through upright, but barely. See mom? Perfectly safe. I finished that crossing and immediately found a beach to rest on.

Once the adrenaline from that ordeal wore off, I realized I could barely move my arms. A few ibuprofen did a little to help, but I had to continue on. My campsite was only 4 miles away, but it felt like 10. I finally made it to the tiny pile of rocks, and from the moment I arrived have been in a turf war with the local sea gulls. I had to eat dinner with a stick in one hand and a spoon in the other. I lay down to write this, only to discover that I have a slow bleeding puncture in my sleeping pad, and no way to find it in the dark. Maybe it was the gulls. The turf war continues. This is going to be a long night.

40 miles down, 180 (ish) to go.