Bass Strait - Day 1: Tidal River to Hogan Island
The night before I flew to Melbourne, I slept horribly.
The stress had been rising over the last few weeks and now, days out from leaving, it had become almost overwhelming. I felt sick at the thought of something happening to me and leaving my young boys without a father. I knew deep down that the probability of something happening to me was low, but it was not zero and that non-zero part was all I could think about.
With only a few hours sleep I put on a brave face in front of my kids while we played, I grabbed my last few things and we went to the airport. After a tearful goodbye I entered the airport to wait for my flight. My brain was going a million miles an hour but fortunately the person next to me on the plane was up for a conversation. To chat to her about life, the trip and personal growth was exactly what I needed to quiet my mind for the 2 hr flight.
After finding Don and his wife, Naomi, who had driven the kayak down, we left Melbourne for Tidal River. We headed straight down to Wilsons Promontory to scout for the next morning's departure.
The Prom is beautiful.
We got there on sunset and went in to talk to the National Parks information centre. We got their recommendation for a potential launch point and then went to see for ourselves. With every hour that passed my anxiety rose. Up until now this trip had been abstract, too far into the future to tenably grasp, but now, standing on the sands of our departure point with only 15 hours until we headed off, it all became VERY REAL.
We headed to the accommodation for the evening to finish packing, eat some dinner and chat to our weather man. One of Don’s friends, Poz, is an experienced sailor and has all the weather information websites and programs one could ask for and he was our weather man - our go/no go man.
Over dinner we chatted to Poz and he gave us the forecast for the next day. It was not ideal, but it wasn’t just the next day that required consideration, it was the next 3 days. We needed 3 reasonable days to get to populated Flinders Island where we could stock up and, if needed, we could wait out bad weather. It wasn’t great conditions but it was good enough to go.
I was stressed beyond belief and had a lot of trouble sleeping. I couldn’t calm my mind that was flooded with thoughts of leaving my kids without a father, no matter how remote the likelihood of that particular catastrophe occuring was. I knew once we got going the training and excitement would kick in and I would be ok but I had a lot of stress leading up to departure.
We hit the beach before sunrise and it was all hands on deck. Packing, repacking, getting dressed and then going over and over my mental checklist to make sure I had everything. As anticipated the stress level fell as we prepared right up until the final call home. I couldn’t hold back the tears as I said my final goodbyes to my wife and kids.
To be clear, the stress I felt was not a reflection of the objective danger of the trip.
But stress is rarely objective.
This was my first post-children adventure and it hit me so much harder than I had anticipated. My ability to align my stress level with the objective risk was so much lower than I realised. This internal struggle was not going to stop me from getting in the kayak and tackling this trip.
“It’s go time”.
We jumped in the kayak and made our way out to the small breaking waves. The water was a lot colder than what we were used to but in a few minutes we were out of the waves and into the gentle swell of the ocean as we made our way around the promontory. It was an amazing feeling to be underway. It had been a long time in the making and now we were taking our first few paddle strokes on our journey across Bass Strait.
As the first few kilometres were travelled, the enormity of our day started to settle into my mind; we had a big day ahead and this was the easy part. Despite the many kilometres left on our journey, the paddle around Wilsons Promontory was spectacular and I tried to soak it in as much as possible as we slowly paddled by.
Our gentle, scenic paddle came to an abrupt halt as we rounded South Point.
We had been sheltered from the wind until we popped out from behind the land into a partial cross-breeze and partial headwind from the North East. It was gusty and swirly and I was not happy. If this was a coastal paddle (although uncomfortable) it was well within our capability, but 30, 40, 50 km offshore, and after 8 hours of paddling, these conditions would have been at the limit of my ability.
I started to question the trip.
“Why are we doing this?” I thought, “This is NOT fun.”
Fortunately the swirly conditions didn’t last long. As we put some distance between us and the headland the wind and waves settled. We still had our cross/headwind but we were able to settle in for our long day ahead.
It’s a strange feeling paddling away from land without being able to see our destination.
It’s stranger still to paddle hour after hour and still not be able to see our target land mass. As strange as it was, it was something that I had spent a lot of time thinking about and researching. Based on accounts from other paddlers, Hogan Island could be seen from as far out as 25km - with some only being able to see it from 5km away. I was hoping for the 25km option and with the visibility we had I thought that would be reasonable. However, to our surprise, we were able to see it from approximately 40km away.
At first I thought I might be seeing things because as the swell rolled through it dropped in and out of view. But it wasn’t long and I knew it was Hogan Island. Now, 40km doesn’t sound that far but there are a few considerations when judging paddling distance. There is present speed and future speed (which really comes down to current and wind conditions).
We were cruising along at about 7km/h - so 40km should be a nice 6hr paddle.
However, we knew that the wind and current would become less favourable as the day went on - meaning that the 6 hour estimate could easily balloon. Each paddle stroke is not too demanding, but there is no resting beyond short food and drink breaks: the cumulative load eventually becomes noticeable and then transitions into pain.
We were probably about half way when the pain started and it didn’t really let up - it just slightly changed in intensity. Our excitement on seeing Hogan Island eventually faded as the hours passed, because the dumb island didn’t appear to be getting closer. Obviously it was getting closer but our progress was slow enough that, even as it gradually became slightly bigger and slightly clearer, it was tedious and incredibly frustrating. Adding to the frustration was the inevitable decline in our pace due to the forecasted worsening conditions coming to fruition.
FYI, pissing in a bottle……it’s not fun and I didn’t like it.
Fortunately, I only had to do it once.
As we approached the island the turbulent conditions returned. The currents and winds were being affected by Hogan Island and we were being affected by them. Our pace dropped from 7km/h to 5km/h or less.
Somehow the word disheartened just doesn’t quite convey the intensity of emotion I felt as the time-to-destination kept growing.
Our speed halved.
The time to camp doubled.
We had been going for over 10 hours as we rounded the top of Hogan for our last little stretch to the sheltered beach. I was depleted and very much looking forward to not paddling anymore, but the sunset views of our host island were breath taking. The sky, the wildlife, the rocky shoreline and our landing point were all beautiful. As we pulled into the bay, and towards the beach, I felt ecstatic by the reprieve on my arms and hands. We knew from the beginning that this was going to be a challenging day, but we’d done it, and now we could rest.
Well……there was one small issue with being in a kayak for 11 hours nonstop - our legs didn’t really work.
After a very ungraceful demount from the kayak we dragged the kayak up the beach.
We had reached Hogan Island safe and sound.
Hogan Island
A quick survey of the hut, a rapid transport of our gear into said hut (and changing into dry clothes) and we were ready for a lovely evening on Hogan Island. We were able to get some mobile phone service on parts of the island and I was very excited to call home. As anticipated, my stress levels had fallen to a much more manageable level. We had done one of our hardest days and I felt great, but it had come at a significant physical toll. For now that was Future-Jarod’s problem: Present-Jarod had some dinner to eat and a comfortable bed to get into. Sleep, for the first time in a few nights, came very easy.
One leg of Bass Strait down. Two to go.