Make Good Decisions

It’s harder to know if you have made good decisions than you think because, as Statham expresses in this podcast, there are multitudes of people out and about in uncontrolled mountain or other wilderness environments, and, most of the time nothing happens. Sometimes that’s because you made good decisions but most of the time it is just luck. Decoding the two is impossible, even when viewed after the event.

If you are interested in decision making and risk mitigation in uncontrolled environments, think mountains, oceans, white water rivers, this is a really good podcast. It is mostly ACMG guides (Association of Canadian Mountain Guides) being interviewed, and, as a Canuck, I can honestly say Canada has some of the worlds most highly trained and intensely skilled mountain guides in the world.

After listening to a few episodes (I’ve only listened to about 5 or 6 out of 67 episodes) I thought a lot about my recent experience paddling to Bass Point. Did I make a good decision having a stronger paddler tow a weaker, slower paddler? I’ll never know for sure because the action I took conclusively averted what I was concerned about (not making it back to the launch site) but did not in any way prove that we wouldn’t have made it back.

One of the guests on the podcast, a Sea Kayak Instructor, said that if the consequence of the decision is minor, don’t worry about it too much. It can be demoralising for adults to be towed by peer group members, but, that consequence is minor compared to having to call Marine Rescue for an extraction in an offshore wind.

One thing all the presenters agree upon is keeping the group together if at all possible. I don’t know what happened to the group of five that followed us in that Saturday, but personally, I have a huge aversion to splitting groups unless absolutely necessary. To often when groups split, the division is anything but orderly and is more commonly the stronger, faster group abandoning the weaker team members. A maxim of mine is never do something that you cannot explain to the rescue team. Many group splits fall into this category.

One of my ski buddies once told me a story of a ski trip that went awry. A party of three (my friend, Delia, and two blokes) drove up to Kootenay Pass for some backcountry ski touring. Delia and the second skier were much faster than the third skier and got to the top of the peak they were going to ski before the third skier. Instead of waiting, Delia and her buddy skied down from the summit leaving the third skier somewhere out in the backcountry in avalanche terrain alone. After skiing to the bottom of the run, Delia and mate put skins on skis and skied back to the top of the run, but the third man was nowhere to be seen. The rest of the day and part of the evening was spent looking for the third man.

What is most bizarre about this story is that my friend D did not see a single thing wrong in her behaviour and, in fact, was vitriolic in her complaints about the third skier and how annoying it was to get home late from a ski day! This is a true story completely devoid of good decisions and most of us easily recognise that. As an aside, after nearly a decade of recreating with my friend, D, we had an irreconcilable split due to differences in risk mitigation strategies. It’s probably fair to say that D, who wobbled her way solo up rock routes, slipped and slid down innumerable snow slopes because she could not self-arrest, skied above other skiers in avalanche terrain or failed to attend to partners skiing avalanche terrain, could never read a map or stay oriented, wandered onto slim bridges over big crevasses eventually became too big a burden to carry mostly because, despite being good company and physically strong, D never understood that out in the Canadian wilderness your risk becomes my risk.

Don't Comply

The southerly has just blown in and the temperature has dropped ten degrees. It was fast paddle day today. Yes, yet another day I didn’t feel like going! Apart from a shore dump and very high tide, an easy launch off the beach, my usual one kilometre warm up and then trying to keep my pace at 8 kilometres/hour. It was a tough haul today, as indicated by Garmin’s measure of my stress (94 out of 100). Of course, I never look at my “stress” score. No-one, not even the software developers at Garmin know what a stress score is or what it means. It’s another way that the tech bros game the system to keep you engaged. My advice is, as always, don’t comply.

Anyway, you can see I didn’t quite make seven kilometres because it was such hard yards out there today. For a while, every fitness influencer on planet earth talked about the concept of recovery, frequently saying nonsensical things like “it’s not that you are training too much, it’s that you are recovering too little.” This is like watching a couple of kids on a see-saw and not grasping the very simple concept that when one kid rides the see-saw up, the other kid must go down. Sure, you can sleep and eat well, perhaps do some stretching or some yoga, but at the end of the day, training is a see-saw. If you do a lot, you will get tired, fatigued, possibly injured and the only way to recover is to do less. Lots of things in life have two complimentary levers. Training has intensity and duration. You can not increase both at the same time. If you increase intensity, you must decrease duration or you’ll blow yourself up.

More Old People Adventures

Doug and I climbed Whale of a Time on the way to Sydney after our Windang weekend. I wouldn’t normally drive to Sydney to climb, although, to be fair, Sydney actually has a lot of good climbing locations, micro crags I would call them. Short routes around 15 metres at most but some are good quality and you have to remember that this is a major city in a country where every level of government is populated by terminally nervous bed-wetters. Yes that is a pejorative. Any culture with such an extreme aversion to risk is not a system wherein humans thrive.

Anyway, I would know nothing about the route except my nephew had asked me to climb it with him. Luckily, and appropriately (a 32 year old man should not be climbing with his 62 year old aunt) he found another climbing partner to complete the climb with. Whale of a Time is insanely popular! Possibly because it is one of the few multi-pitch climbs within striking distance of Sydney, or because it is a short walk in (although I feel like I spent more time walking than climbing), or maybe because it is well bolted and the overlook is scenic. Strangely, it seems that, much like my nephew, most people who climb the route climb only Whale of a Time, not any of the other routes on the crag! An Australian thing, I suspect.

Access is via abseil and we got to the top anchors just a few moments after a couple of young blokes with an 80 metre rope. For some crazy reason, Australian climbers have been seduced into buying 80 metre ropes although most pitches are less than half of 60 metres. Eighty metres is a lot of rope to deal with on 15 metre pitches. But, in this instance it was handy as we asked the young blokes if we could abseil on their rope which saved us doing two abseils to get to the start of the route and meant that they could start up the route without waiting for us to clear the first pitch.

It’s a funny climb. A weirdly stiff start, followed by a long traverse which apart from a couple of moves is shuffling along a small foot ledge with good ironstone plate handholds and then a very easy pitch to finish. The ironstone plates look strong but there are broken holds all along the route! It was outrageously windy by the time we were at the top of the first pitch although the young blokes climbed quickly they had 80 metres of rope to deal with and that takes time. We scurried up the last pitch and really took very little time to enjoy the ambience as it was freezing! Typical Australian spring weather, from 32 Celsius to a howling gale and driving spittle.

On Thursday I started my “fast training.” To paddle long distances (or run or bicycle) you need good aerobic capacity and the only way – despite what the headlines might say – to build aerobic capacity is the usual – loved or hated (it can be both) – long aerobic distance. This used to be called long slow distance until the people who name things realised that some people have such massive aerobic capacity that their aerobic pace is not that slow. Hence, long aerobic distance. The only problem with long aerobic distance is that if you do nothing else, you risk being really slow. So, in addition to long aerobic distance, when I am training I try to get some fast short distance. This goes something like: 10 to 15 minute warm-up (or paddle about a kilometre) then try to keep an 8 kilometre/hour pace for an hour or so, followed by a 10 to 15 minute cool down or one kilometre. I’ve pushed this as high as 1.5 hours at an 8+ kilometre/hour pace, but, as with all training, you have to build up. Consistency is better than one shot and you are burnt out. It’s much easier to do this on flat water but I don’t do big flat water trips so I usually tough it out and do it on the ocean. Sometimes conditions are such that hitting 8 kilometres/hour is a tough gig.

On Sunday, I risked the crowds to ride the Mogo trails only there were no crowds! I don’t know if it was lunch time or too hot or the other riders could smell the waft of my Deet and Permethrine tick repellent but the trails were really quiet. For the first time since the tick incident I rode on the shady side, down Al Capone’s Garden – what a hoot – and up Jackhammer. Of course, I had literally a dozen phantom ticks coming up Jackhammer as it is still damp down there and the forest is very green and overhangs the trail but luckily all the ticks were mere imaginings.

Sometimes It's Better Not To Know: Burrewarra Point and Beyond

It’s another one of those days when I’m doing something I don’t really feel like doing. Briefly I wonder how many of these days there are in the average week and consider noting them down in my training log but then decide it would be depressing to find out that five out of seven days I’m heading out to do something I don’t really want to do. It’s probably better not to know.

PC: DB

We are heading south at a rate that is too fast for my paddling effort, we are going to pay for this northerly current. It’s bumpy and I feel queasy all the way to our turn around point. There are dolphins at the mouth of Sunshine Bay, a whale in the bay north of Burrewarra Point, and seals around Burrewarra Point resting, as they do, in the break zone.

PC: DB

On long training days I like to schedule our land break after we pass the half way point in the paddle. Today we are paddling 30 kilometres so around 20 kilometres is a good time to stop. At south Rosedale, the odometer ticks over 19 kilometres so we stop for a break. North from Rosedale, the easterly wind has ticked up and it’s a bumpy paddle all the way back to our home bay. Current and wind, clapotis and chop. It’s good to finish the day.

Five Islands: The Perfect Paddle

Last time I launched from Fishermans Beach we parked at the south end near Hill 60 and enjoyed carrying four kayaks over our heads along a narrow walkway and down some steep steps. Forewarned, as they say, is forearmed so this time we parked on Gloucester Boulevarde (busy on this sunny Sunday in October) and trolleyed the kayaks down a cement ramp all the way to the sand.

PC: DB

After an easy launch, we paddled north to Flinders Islet watching dolphins and whales breaking the surface as we went. We lapped around Flinders Islet and continued to Bass Islet. Half way between the two islands a friendly whale swam leisurely past our kayaks slapping it’s massive fins into the water. This is, apparently, the closest Paul S had been to whales and he was ecstatic. After the whale departed we cruised around Bass Islet and continued south to Martin Islet. Last time I paddled past Martin Islet the gap between Big Island and Martin Islet was completely closed out. This time we paddled close in beside the seals that live on Martin Islet and drifted leisurely through the gap.

PC: DB

Big Island was a wash with birds. Pelicans at the acme of the island, cormorants, gulls, oyster catchers occupying lesser locations. Finally, a lap around Rocky Islet where, even on this calm day the swell picked up over the western most gap and back to Fishermans Beach and left over cake from the AGM the afternoon before. What a day, couldn’t be better.

PC: DB

It was not, however, a day without wind because by 4:00 pm the westerly was blowing 40 knots and I had trouble walking against it as I hiked back from Windang Island.

PC: DB

Blowing In The Wind: Prepare for the Worst

It’s been a windy year. Winter is always the season of the westerly wind on the coast, but lately, apparently due to Sudden Stratospheric Warming, our usual spring pattern has been disrupted by continuous strong westerly to northwesterly winds. The day before the NSW Sea Kayak Club Annual General Meeting (AGM) at Windang, Doug and I had been rock climbing at Nowra, where, on the escarpment top, the westerly wind was howling. Luckily, down at crag level, we were somewhat sheltered.

On Saturday, I had a full contingent of paddlers (six plus me) for an ocean paddle. I had originally intended to paddle out Tom Thumb Passage, turn the kayaks south and paddle down to Bushranger Bay and Maloneys Bay, two small sheltered bays on the protuberant Bass Point. In 2024, with a group of women paddlers, we had paddled out of Tom Thumb Channel and down to Kiama. The channel at that time was deep with the current running out but nothing too crazy. We had debated at length how long after the Port Kembla tide change the current would switch directions with estimates ranging from one hour (from a very confident individual) to two or more hours (me). I can now say, after observing Lake Illawarra and Tom Thumb Passage over multiple days that the current changes approximately 2.5 hours after tide change at Port Kembla.

The afternoon before Saturday’s paddle, I walked down to look at Tom Thumb Entrance. It was interesting. A strong tidal stream was running out with standing waves inside the channel (small), and a series of standing waves (a little bigger) north of Windang Island. All manageable with a competent group of paddlers, but, as I was thinking about the next day’s paddle, I started imagining the worst case scenario. It’s always useful to consider the worst case scenario in addition to your preferred (best case) scenario because if you are prepared for the worst case the best case is a doddle. If, however, you have not considered the worst case, you could find yourself in a challenging and dangerous situation.

The worst case of a capsize in or near the channel was a complex rescue in fast moving water (with standing waves) that would be further complicated by the forecast afternoon wind, paddler fatigue, and boat traffic. The more I looked at the channel, particularly in conjunction with the forecast, the more I thought about changing the launch site.

One or my issues as a leader, which will surprise anyone that knows me, is that I can be too agreeable! Impossible, I hear you say, how can anyone be too agreeable? But you can. You can agree to many things against your better judgement simply to be agreeable. Agreeableness is one of the big five personality traits. You can measure your own agreeableness here. A couple of people, including Doug, wanted to launch from Windang. To be clear, I also wanted to launch from Windang because it obviated the need to drive, but, after looking at the tide, the weather forecast, the currents, and the channel, I decided to move the launch site south to Little Beach which is a small sandy beach inside the old Shellharbour marina.

This would shorten the trip to Bass Point and back by seven kilometres and allow us time to explore the south side of Bass Point which is far more interesting than the coast immediately around Windang. The biggest boon, of course, would be shortening up the distance we would have to paddle into the wind at the end of the day. Like most people I usually plan paddle days to start into the wind and return, when people are tired, with a tail wind, but heading north from Windang is all long sandy beach and not very interesting paddling.

Which brings me naturally to the forecast weather and how confident I felt in the forecast. Meteye had a very clear and unnatural dividing line where the wind was forecast due west (10 to 15 knots) on land and north to northwest on the ocean. Life, and weather, are seldom clear cut and I was very suspicious that the strong westerlies would be, somehow, northerly, one, two or even three kilometres off shore. Maybe 10 or 20 kilometres off shore, but not along the on-shore waters that sea kayakers typically frequent.

So, an off-shore wind, the most consequential wind there is for sea kayakers. Yet another reason to launch from further south. We got away closer to 9:30 am than 9:00 am owing to the usual kerfuffle that accompanies bigger groups. I had two very willing assistants as two paddlers were working towards Paddle Australia guide status (one Enclosed Sea and one Sea Guide). I think I am too new a Sea Guide myself to be a great supervisor to aspiring guides and, of course, there is my agreeableness which makes it hard for me to correct inappropriate decisions or behaviour.

I wanted to look at emergency landing sites on the way to Bass Point so we went right into where the old jetty is that was used to load gravel on ships. There is a small boat ramp, exposed in northerlies but offering a reasonable landing in a pinch. Other than that, there is only Maloneys Bay on the south side of Bass Point or the new Shellharbour marina but if you make it that far you have only a kilometre or so to return to Little Beach.

By the time we had paddled around Bass Point and ducked into Bushranger Bay the west wind was up and passing by Maloneys Bay, exploring all the little bays and caves along the shore to Killalea Beach it was clear that a strong and gusty west wind would greet us on the north side of Bass Point. We had lunch at Maloneys Bay where there is very little sand left after a series of east coast lows. I partnered stronger paddlers with weaker paddlers before we left the beach making sure to pair PS, who has – there is no polite way to say this – a terrible paddle stroke with Doug. Paddlers can limp along with a bad stroke in benign conditions but, when you need power into a headwind, that ineffective short stroke becomes a real liability.

We were blown rapidly along the south shore of Bass Point at a cracking pace but, as we started to negotiate the rougher water on the east end of Bass Point, PS got slower and slower. My watch indicated our speed had fallen below four kilometres an hour and we were not even into the wind yet! Eventually, we got around the breaking reef that runs northeast from Bass Point and most of us were able to pick out the breakwater around the old marina that was our destination. PS, despite having it pointed out to him, could not seem to locate it and kept drifting further north.

I left PS to paddle on with Doug for 10 or 15 agonising minutes. By this time we had a headwind of about 15 to 18 knots with stronger gusts and my watch indicated our pace was, at times, as slow as 2.5 kilometres/hour. As everyone who has paddled into the wind knows, at a certain wind strength all forward progress stops because the kayaker is being blown backwards as fast or faster than they can paddle. With a wind that runs up or down the coast, there is some lee-way, but off-shore winds are dodgy. Finally, I made the call, PS needed to be towed. Doug hooked him on and immediately we were doing a much more respectable 4.5 kilometres/hour. PS started to look more comfortable and less rigid, although I am sure he was not happy with being towed.

Somewhere around 1.5 kilometres from our destination, PS had sped up enough that he passed Doug and that was our sign to remove the tow line. The wind had not decreased but we did have less chop and PS was now paddling well solo. He was still heading in the wrong direction – to the south this time – but, as I brought up the rear of the group, I could see all the paddlers in front of and, even PS, would safely hit the beach if he kept his course.

Just as we were all ready to leave to drive back to Windang, probably 40 or so minutes after we had landed, I spotted two kayakers coming in. This was the remnants, or perhaps a better term would be leading edge, of a group of five who had gone out to Bushrangers Bay. Three were no where to be seen, but, another two did come into sight very far out, probably a couple of kilometres still off-shore as we were driving off. The final and fifth paddler had somehow made his way to a rocky landing near the gravel loader jetty and had to be later retrieved by car by the other paddlers. So glad that was not my trip!

Freedom is Hard Work

It’s always good and bad, yin and yang, dark and light, left and right. There are lots of families out on the mountain bike trails these days with the warm, dry weather and school holidays in the final week, and that is fantastic but it’s also depressing because the responsible adults are shuttling their kids in vehicles to avoid the uphill ride which is under 100 vertical metres in most instances. Yeah, kids, who should be fit and active are learning to use fossil fuel powered machines to avoid discomfit. We all know this won’t end well, or perhaps we don’t. Increasingly, we are either removed from the consequences of our actions or we pretend that we bear no responsibility.

The morning after a night on a mountain

Years ago (2010), late afternoon in early winter when the days are as short as they can be, I jumped into a helicopter with my ski pack to fly into the southern Selkirk Mountains because a snowmobiler had fallen with snowmobile into an abandoned mine shaft. It was early December so the snow-pack was less consolidated than it would be in late winter or early spring and by 4:30 pm it would be dark. I took my skis because I knew the area (the only person in the group who did) having skied in there a few times previously, and knew that if the rescue were delayed and the helicopter could not retrieve us, I could slap my skis on and be out at the road in two or three hours. I had previously spent a winter night with a dead body on a ridge in the middle of winter after a search for a crashed light aircraft. Virtually no-one survives a light aircraft crash particularly in deep forest as the trees shear the wings off the plane as it falls through the forest. It had been a long, cold night and not one I wanted to repeat if it wasn’t necessary.

My compatriots on the search team were, as one, dismissive of me taking skis, and, tried mighty hard to discourage me. Until, of course, the helicopter set us down in the winter snow-pack where the foot penetration was near mid thigh deep and my skis were invaluable for packing down a path for us all to use to access the rescue site. By the time we had the injured snow-mobiler on the surface, it was too late for a helicopter retrieval, and we ended up being extracted by snowmobile well after dark. I could have skied out, but the snowmobile was faster. I’ll never forget how free and confident I felt knowing that I could, under my own power and responsible for and to no-one get myself out of the backcountry and home to safety and comfort.

Freedom it turns out is not free. You have to work for it every day by keeping your mind and body in a place where you can prevail against unexpected conditions. It’s a helluva lot easier to ride up a short hill than it is to prevail in dark, dangerous and desperate times so you may as well get as much practice in on easy days as you can.

The Wave Rider Buoy (again)

That which we avoid gets nastier. Will Gadd.

Friday was sunny and I paddled down to Guerilla Bay to meet some kayaking friends. There were a couple of whales in the shallow bay between Pretty Point and Jimmies Island when I went past, but, by the time we were back out to sea, the whales had moved on. My friends went south, while I went back north, paddling home into a light headwind. South would have been a 40 kilometre day for me. Those will come soon enough this summer!

On Saturday we went rock climbing. It may be the tick situation (that’s what Doug thinks) but my head is just not in rock climbing mode these days. I am distracted and it’s difficult to try hard. I am such a useless climber I have to try hard all the time. On Thursday, Doug had called me and let me know that his riding partner had picked up a tick on the mountain bike trails, so on both my climbing day (Saturday) and my mountain biking day (Thursday), I went out in my covering of full body 80% Deet and permethrine treated clothing. I checked frequently for ticks, and my clothes went into the dryer when I got home.

The events surrounding my near death experiences with ticks still flash into my mind a lot, and I take precautions virtually every day of my life now. Getting bitten by a tick in the house means I can never let my guard down. But I do not want to become part of the “stress injured”; the walking not wounded people whose identity is permanent victim status. This is one of the other things we used to know implicitly but forgot in the fourth great awokening, no good comes from believing yourself a victim.

Today we paddled out to the Batemans Bay Wave Rider Buoy. Paddling directly out to sea for 10 kilometres I realised how long it has been since I have done this kind of paddling. Nothing much to look at but the wobbly horizon, the weird and slightly unsettling experience of leaving land far behind as we paddle on a compass bearing, the different environment that is encountered far off-shore: shearwaters wheeling overhead, schools of fish jumping, even a few whales. Our route was pretty direct, just veering to the south when we were within half a kilometre of the buoy and Doug had spotted the ragged black flag.

The buoy looks like it’s been through a few storms, but then again, haven’t we all.

The Last Week of September: Paddling, Hiking, Biking, Skiing

Sunday was, of course, paddle day. Conditions were very good with a modest swell and light winds. I probably would have picked a different beach to launch from if I had known there would be six paddlers, but we went from our home bay across to North Head and up the Murramarang Coast to Dark Beach. It was possible to paddle into the cave if you were careful.

On Thursday, I went out to get some elevation training on the legs. What you really want is a very steep climb of about a thousand metres or, at least 800 metres over a short distance. That’s very tough here on the coast without driving a long way. West of the coast, there are some hills that reach almost 700 metres, but the starting elevation is 100 metres, the drive takes an hour each way, and the fire trails are less steep than ideal. When I was training for Canada in 2019, I had worked out the drive time to elevation gain per metre ratio for a variety of hill climbs within an hours drive! Bolaro Mountain Fire Trail, which is only about half an hour from home, seems to work reasonably well for limited driving. You can go either south to Bolaro or north to the communication towers on Erics Ridge, and I got 740 metres of gain out of that.

On Friday, with stiff legs, I got on the mountain bike and rode around the trails. My lucky day in that I did not encounter any E-bikes! Saturday, we headed off to the Snowy Mountains and stopped at Molongolo Gorge Reserve to walk the trail along Molongolo Creek on the way. A pretty little river running in a steep sided canyon with a half dozen small cascades along its length.

Sunday, of course, was skiing. From Guthega Pondage, we skied up the long gentle south ridge that eventually leads up to the Rolling Grounds. The only walking required was the 1.3 kilometres down the pondage road, across the dam wall, and up the old road on the north side of the Snowy River. There was enough snow to put skis on above the Snowy River and, by skiing to one side or other of the higher ridge, we skied all the way to Consett Stephen Pass and up the ridge north of Mount Tate. There were a number of skiers heading up the ridge but they all seemed to turn back after a couple of hundred metres. We had one run down into Falls Creek which was pleasant yet short, but otherwise, the day was trundling along on the low angle slopes that characterise the flattest continent on the planet.