Back on the horse

Yep, yesterday I made it back on the water. I probably shouldn’t have gone kayaking considering I took a flu/cold thing during the week which knocked me off my feet for a couple of days and I was still feeling under par yesterday. But I felt it was psychologically important for me to get paddling again and get past the fear of last week.

We set of to the Blackwater, putting in at Benburb. It’s not everyone’s favourite place as some of the drops can be a little tricky and with really high water some of it can be unrunnable. I was really nervous for about the first hour, well probably up to my first capsize. After that I felt I’d got through the worst and was less jittery. I even managed to attempt some playing in the holes, though I was still a bit nervy with it. Altogether I capsized four times though by the end of the day it felt like more! The first time I’d taken a bad line down a drop, so I tried the same drop a second time and this time my line was perfect but I didn’t paddle hard enough to get past the hole. My third capsize was shooting a rapid the guys call the ‘V’, man the water was huge! I think I came flying off a rock and lost my balance, the same thing happened to a couple of the others. Then further down the river we were at a wee playspot and I just got too lax – I was sitting in the eddy kind of drifting towards the rapid and before I knew it my boat was flipped. However after that I tried to play a bit more and got flipped again, only this time I managed to roll myself back up, woo-hoo! In the process I managed to dislodge a contact lens but thankfully it was still in my eye so got it back into place no bother. Maybe I should start wearing disposables on kayak days!

I wouldn’t say I was paddling brilliantly yesterday, I don’t think I demonstrated a progression in terms of my skill-level, but I achieved what I set out to achieve – I got past the fear that had overwhelmed me last week and by the end of the day I was smiling – so that was good enough for me. I think I’ve reached a stage where I’m realising afresh just how much I have to learn. My confidence had been on the up until last week and I was kind of cruising along thinking I could do anything (well within reason) but right now I’m very aware of my limitations and fears. In my spare time I surf the net or read magazines about people doing Grade 5 stuff and that just blows my mind, I have no idea how they do it. I definitely can’t see myself doing that! But I’m thinking this is probably a good place to be in – I need to put some graft in and push myself to the next level. The club’s Scotland trip is going ahead for the end of March, and my name is down for it, so I need to work hard to get ready for that, I’m still nervous about it (plus there’s the fact that at the moment I’m the only girl in the club! All that machismo might get to me after 5 days!) but kayaking is about having fun and I think it’s everyone’s intention that we have fun on this trip!

Photo comes courtesy of Jackson Kayak