Islands In The Sea: Granite, Wright, Pullen and West Islands

Even though down here in Australia we live on a big island, sea kayakers are still ineluctably drawn to off-shore islands. Close in shore, far from the mainland, rocky, sandy, precipitous we just love paddling out to and around islands. Being able to land is a bonus, but far from a necessity.

In Encounter Bay, by the town of Victor Harbour, there is a scattering of granite islands, mostly low lying, they are all close in to shore and can be paddled in a single day trip. We launched from tiny Horseshoe Bay which is semi-sheltered by Pullen Island, around 9 am one Sunday morning. The beach was quiet and we easily walked our boats down the surf club ramp to the beach, paddled out through a small break and past Freeman Nob into the rolling swells of the Southern Ocean.

Down here in the Southern Ocean, the wave period is long, I think on this day it was nearly 15 seconds so we kept a close eye out for breaking reefs and bommies. Heading southwest, we quickly came to Granite Island. This is a major tourist attraction in the area, connected to the mainland by a 250 metre long causeway along which a long suffering horse is forced to pull a large carriage over-burdened with tourists who need exercise way more than the horse does. We avoided this nonsense by paddling around the south side of Granite Island.

Continuing southwest to Wright Island we were paddling outside a line of breaking reefs and passed Wright Island to the south as well. Wright Island is a smaller version of Granite Island, without the horse.  Next comes Rosetta Head, a large granite dome that rises to 100 metres and is well worth the walk up for the view. There is a really nice trail that leads from town all along the coast to join the Heysen Trail at King Beach and goes over the top of Rosetta Head.

Further southwest, our last island for today, West Island, formerly a granite quarry, now a Conservation Park. We looped around West Island, paddling by sea lions on the rocks and many sea birds. Landing at King Beach, the last sheltered landing on the Fleurieu Peninsula for the next forty kilometres, required wrapping around a breaking reef to the east and then paddling back west to surf into the beach. Granite rocks stud the small sand beach so a careful landing is necessary.

On our way back to Horseshoe Bay, we paddled into Rosetta Harbour and passed along the northern sides of Wright and Granite Island although this required dodging a lot of breaking reefs. Finally, we wrapped around the eastern side of Pullen Island at Horseshoe Bay and confronted a beach packed with swimmers along the full length. As a good southerly wind had now whipped the seas up, the landing required a bit more attention, especially as taking out a swimmer was now a real possibility. Twice we lined up a clear space to land and then had a tourist wander in to the water directly in front of our kayaks, much like the proverbial deer in the headlights.

Eventually, we managed to dash into shore and then had to man handle our kayaks - almost six metres long - through the throngs on the beach, a more difficult feat than any of the paddling we had done.

Small Adventures Around The Fleurieu Peninsula: Victor Harbour to Moana Beach By Sea Kayak

Myponga Beach is a small half circle of sand with a tumbledown jetty at the south end and holiday cottages strung along the shore behind a breakwall of stacked stone blocks. It also offers the first sheltered landing we have passed in the last 26 kilometres as we rocketed northeast up the coast of the Fleurieu Peninsula blown along by strong southwesterly winds and chased by rain squalls.

We pull down our sails, land the kayaks and walk up to the top of the short beach to try and find some shelter from the 20 knot wind for our first meal of the day. In wet clothes, under a sky gloomy with rain clouds, we are cold and uncomfortable. Below the breakwall we find some marginal shelter and use the stacked stone blocks as a table to cut up vegetables and lay out lunch.

A mere two metres from us, a man sits in a chair on his porch studiously keeping his head down and reading a magazine. Of a sudden, I feel like Gandalf confronting Bilbo Baggins on a sunny morning in the shire, "I am looking for someone to share in an adventure that I am arranging, and it's very difficult to find anyone." Bilbo: "I should think so - in these parts! We are plain, quiet folk and have no use for adventures. Nasty disturbing uncomfortable things! Make you late for dinner!"

Our adventure started two days before on a sunny calm morning at Kent Reserve in Victor Harbour just on the south side of a 250 metre causeway out to the appropriately named Granite Island. We packed our boats with five days of food and water and set off to paddle around the stunning Fleurieu Peninsula, south of Adelaide. We dodged the reefs and breaking swells to exit Victor Harbour and paddled around the granite dome of Rosetta Head to land briefly at King Beach in the shelter of West Island, another small granite outcrop that is home to a few seals and many sea birds. We were only an hour into our day but this was the last place we knew we could land easily before Blowhole Beach 50 kilometres from Victor Harbour.

From King Beach we paddled under 100 metre sea cliffs to Newland Head. A few days before, while walking this section of coast on the Heysen Trail we had watched as a paraglider crash landed on the cliff edge and hurrying to see if we could be of assistance, we found him moaning in pain and suspended by the delicate lines of his paraglider over a 100 metre drop.

Around Newland Head we paddled west past several long sandy beaches fully exposed to the crashing waves of the Southern Ocean. We were hoping to land and camp at Tunkalilla Beach, known by local kayakers as the best landing spot among a bunch of bad landing spots, and, when we arrived mid afternoon, we spent some time venturing in towards shore then back out again as the dumping swell crash landed hard onto the beach sending reverberating waves back out to sea again.

If we managed to survive the landing, would we get off the beach next morning? Unable to answer an emphatic yes to this question, we kept paddling, heading for the safest known landing spot on this long section of coast, a small sandy bay 16 kilometres to the west.

There was no wind, but the tidal current which can peak at three knots in Backstairs Passage was running west and we made good time paddling past more cliffs, rocky sea caves, and deep creek gorges along this section of coast. Finally, after seven hours and 50 kilometres, we made Blowhole Beach and landed in small surf on the short sandy beach and called it a day.

Next morning we left just as the sun was rising aiming to catch the tidal current again as it surged around to Cape Jervis. The cliffs diminish along this section of coast, and there are tiny sand beaches, grassy hillsides of cleared farming land, and low rocky cliffs. Cape Jervis is a very small harbour protected by a big breakwall and the mainland terminus of the Kangaroo Island ferry. The locals apparently like to drive down to watch the ferry come and leave, which seemed to us about as interesting as watching lawn bowls.

We spent a couple of hours at Cape Jervis waiting for the tide to change and the northeasterly flowing current to ramp up. When we left, after big mugs of tea and a hearty plate of bacon and eggs cooked on our camping stove, the current was gently surging north and we had an easy and very scenic paddle north to Rapid Bay. The cliffs were tall, the water wonderfully clear and aqua green, seals lay about on rock shelves and we gazed into sea caves and arches as we paddled by.

North of Rapid Bay we found a tiny strip of sand beach in between tall rock cliffs with a deep cave at the back, a perfect spot to rest for the night. It had been such a warm, sunny day that we swam off our little beach before clambering around exploring our rocky cavern. The beauty of the spot was marred only by graffiti spray painted on the cliffs and a dozen empty alcohol bottles that we packed up into a discarded shopping bag and carried out with us.

The next day brought a strong southwesterly change and launching off our little beach was much more difficult than landing. I weakened and accepted a push off from Doug leaving him to get himself off the beach without his kayak broaching and smashing onto the rocks. He did very well, only needing to get out of the kayak once to turn it back into the waves. Immediately we were at sea we put our sails up and thus began a very rapid run up the coast.

Most of this day passed in a blur. It rained on and off, the wind gusted at times but was mostly steady around 20 knots, we passed long beaches, small towns, rocky limestone headlands, and finally, after a few hours we rounded a long stretch of limestone cliffs and there was Myponga Beach and a place to land and eat.

North of Myponga Beach, at the very southern end of Sellicks Beach, where the wind waves were as well organised as an ocean swell, we landed in small surf and found a final perfect resting spot tucked into a ravine under crumbling rock and dirt cliffs. It was a relief to get out of wet clothes and the wind. We had dinner that night sitting on flat rocks above the beach as the sun set over the Southern Ocean.

At 5.15 am on our last morning I was happy for the dry South Australian air which enabled us to dry our paddling clothes each night no matter how late we draped them over shrubs and rocks at days end. Although my tights and shirt were now so salty they virtually stood up on their own, they were at least dry to put on as I crawled out of the tent to make coffee. I can go without food but a 20 kilometre paddle in the early morning without coffee is what really makes adventures nasty disturbing uncomfortable things.

We launched into a much attenuated sea state before dawn and began a long slow paddle north to Moana Beach. The scenery was all long sandy beaches, a bit bland in character with little to hold a paddlers interest and we were starting to feel tired after over a hundred kilometres of paddling in three days. There are two daily buses from Seaford, near Moana Beach to Victor Harbour and we were hoping to get one person on the 10 am bus to retrieve our car. It was going to be close as the kilometres seemed to sidle by so slowly, paddling against the tide and with no wind to help us.

Finally, we saw the surf club, steps up a dirt cliff, and in a final sprint push we raced the boats into the beach. I jumped out, grabbed my day pack and changed out of my wet clothes into shorts and running shoes and with Google maps issuing directions I started jogging to the Seaford Interchange. Just as Google maps was announcing "you are arriving at your destination" I saw the #1252 bus pull up to the red traffic lights, waving my hand madly at the driver, he opened the door and let me on.

Climb Harder Or Better

Another couple of sessions climbing with my nephew. It was fun; much more two climbing partners out for a few pitches than last time when I just set ropes for him and belayed. I got him using a Gri-Gri to belay me with and it turns out he can catch lead falls, something that inspires a lot more confidence in me.

He tries hard, for a relatively short period of time. Peaks early, as a climbing buddy of mine would say. He started leading this time and did much better than me leading every route we climbed. I must admit it was tough to get on the sharp end after him as even the grade 11 we climbed looked burly climbed in his usual style.

As with most new climbers he is obsessed with climbing harder. Unfortunately, climbing harder does not necessarily mean climbing better and the only sure fire way to climb harder is to focus on climbing better. Often that means stepping back a number of grades from the highest grade you have managed to thrutch and thrash up. A hard concept to explain to a testosterone driven young male anxious to perform well before his peers. A number grade is easy to brag about, climbing well is a much more elusive concept, although we all know it when we see it.

Nate Droilet, a US climbing coach writes about the importance of climbing well as a stepping stone to climbing harder. Climbing is a somewhat unique sport because the temptation is to make every climbing session about performance, most commonly conceived of as climbing the hardest grade possible. This is uniquely dissimilar to other sports like golf or tennis where players go out and practice individual skills and save performance for designated games.

Rock climbing, however, requires engrams of literally hundreds of different moves because every climb is different. Thus proficiency requires more than just jug hauling your way up the grades, you must develop not only the physical strength and flexibility to master thousands of different movement patterns but also wire together the nervous system to move fluidly into one move after another.

It will be interesting to see how he progresses. I suspect that he will plateau rapidly unless much more attention is given to technique and much less given to climbing the hardest grade possible.