Oh...great...kayaking...

Remember how exciting that prospect seemed in the last post? I do. Remember what happened when we went last year? I barely do, but here are the main things to catch you up. Deanna and I went on a sunset kayak tour where we went out in tandem kayaks to watch the sunset and then come back...about 2.5 hours. You might think "that sounds romantic"...only our group had 7 tween/teen girls and a 10 year old boy who were all related somehow...and no parent with them at all. At one point the boat with the 10 year old ran into us...I said "hey, see these other yellow things around you? They're boats with people. Watch where you're going." He started to cry and I felt no qualms whatsoever.

I remembered a few important things on our way out today: My knee that hurts fine on it's own after a Tae Kwon Do injury didn't feel to good crammed in that boat...answer, 3 advil pre trip this time. It can get cold and wet, but not as cold as people lead on: answer, wicking shirt and a wind breaker.

As we got there I remembered a few more. The aquasox they lend you suck, and they hurt your heels...where your regular shoes. And..."I think the water was calm last time."

So here is the inside of the kayak where my legs are supposed to go. Not a lot of space, and with the foot pegs as far as they would go, I couldn't straighten out my legs. All we're doing so far is inspecting the boats.

We then get in so we can practice attaching the skirt to the kayak.

Our guide, Sean, seems pretty cool, and we're the only people with him on the tour, so that is nice.
Finally we get out on the water. I couldn't WAIT to get out on the water! (remember this part for later)

Here's Deanna and I out in the water ready to rock!

The water today? Choppy. As soon as we headed out Deanna's foot cable came loose. The person in the back has rudder control with their feet...I'm too tall to do it. So Sean comes to us and finds out the left pedal is loose and fixes it. Mere seconds later the right one comes loose. He fixes it. I'm getting irritated 'cause I want to get out there and paddle! (remember this one too)

We finally get all set and head out. Sean is all jokes. This and the water and the paddling is good for about 10 minutes. The choppiness of the water and the fact that my foot is asleep starte to irritate me...then everything starts to irritate me. The best thing for me to do in this situation is say nothing until I can bore through some of the paddling and throw out a funny (and not biting) comment to put people at ease. 30 minutes into it I was done with the water, I was done with the paddling, I was done with Sean's jokes. It was three hours.

I was hoping for a tour that was longer, but had a break on land in between so I could take pictures. I'm glad I didn't do that.

Unless there is a kayak called "The Daddy Longlegs" or something bigger, I've done my last kayak adventure for a long while. Deanna really wanted to do this, and she's feeling the same way. We did see a bald eagle in a tree, and I took a picture, but it was too far away.

After the trip we got pizza and went to the show. Great house tonight and a fun show. Deanna and I had a great scene where we were spouses on X-mas...I got her socks and she got me an HDTV tuner.

Tomorrow is my day off. Not sure yet what I'll do.