After my breakfast-induced nausea of yeaterday, I opted to skip a real breakfast and just eat a clif bar instead. I had hoped it would let me paddle comfortably, but apparently it was just not meant to be. I still felt awful. By some rough math, I was at this point only consuming around 1200 calories a day. A quick Google search informed me that a 200 pound person burns around 450 calories an hour while kayaking. I'm paddling 8 hours a day, meaning I should be burning around 3600 calories. Which has me curious as to why the hell I'm not hungry. Maybe I'm just the prius of kayakers?
Regardless, today would be a good day. The route I was taking was almost entirely sheltered from the wind, meaning that I was able to sleep in and take my time getting on the water. I moved pretty slowly at first, waiting for my shoulders to work out some of the soreness as they had the day before. In one of my dumber moments however, I had completely forgotten to take ibuprofen this morning. It took me two hours to figure out why my shoulders still hurt, and another hour after that before I could land anywhere to take ibuprofen to help. Another valuable lesson learned: keep the ibuprofen handy.
Although I had seen seals every day so far, and a few porpises here and there, I didn't see any today. Instead, I got treated to a show courtesy of an immature eagle and a raft of eiders. The eagle apparently wanted his (or her? Who knows) morning snack, and the eider's ducklings seemed to be just what he was looking for. The eagle would dive down to grab a duckling, and just as he got within reach all the ducks would do a synchronized dive under the water to avoid him. This lasted for a few minutes, until the eagle decided that a duck just wasn't worth the effort. He flew off to a big pine tree, plopped down on the top branch, and promptly fell face first into the branches below as his branch broke in two. He flew off to another tree, and made it half way there before realizing he was still holding on to half a branch.
As the day wore on, I gradually got grumpier and grumpier, despite the fact that nothing was actually going wrong. Skipping breakfast was coming back to bite me in the ass in the form of some severe hanger. The wind was finally picking up, so after a brief internal debate I decided I would stop to change into my dry top and, like a responsible adult, eat a pile of cookies. Both proved to be good choices. Now my arms weren't freezing every time they dove into a wave, and since my hanger had been replaced with some mild nausea, I was no longer shouting expletives at every wave washing over me. The last 8 miles to camp ended up being the second most enjoyable part of the day, clearly not surpassing the eagle's embarrassing morning. The waves and wind at my back sped me along, and I made it to camp almost 45 minutes earlier than I had expected.
Once I was in camp however, I was presented with the most difficult choice of the trip: did I want dry paddling clothes, or a nice morning view from my tent? I had limited options on where to pitch my tent and set up a clothes line. I opted for the dry clothes, this was not a view worth putting on a damp wetsuit for.
84 miles down, 140 (ish) to go.
Wow James! You are making some time and distance! Stop in Castine and say hi if you get up his way! looks like you will have some wind but at least it will be at your back! Good luck with your stomach!
ReplyDeletePoseidon stopped by this morning, said he'd be setting up a small craft advisory for you this afternoon despite the pagan rituals we've been performing on your behalf. We'll be in Stonington in the afternoon if you want to step out of waterworld and onto dryland for a spell. Can you say mozzarella sticks?
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