15 – feb 2: sea kayaking

this day will remain as one of the most pleasant days we have spent in new zealand. not only it was full of excitement and danger (while being reasonably safe), but we also got to meet new, and awezome, people.

after a long period of trying to arrange of what could we do in the sounds, we decided to grab the offer to go sea kayaking with rosco’s milford sound sea kayaking company. we have spent most of yesterday trying to decide if we should go for the “peaceful” and “easy” morning sea kayaking experience, or try for the more “adventurous” afternoon trip. after a long period of weighting the pluses and minuses (the particular plus to the afternoon trip being that it takes you more into the sounds, as you go out by powerboat, and return by kayak), oleg had me convinced due to his argument that the word “adventurous” was used to deter overweight americans.

boy, were we wrong (well, right, but more right than we knew!)

afternoon kayaking trip departed at 2:30pm from milford sound, which is about 2 hours from te anau, from which we were about 20 minutes away. of course oleg intended that we leave around 10:30-11, and my inability to wake up early led to us leaving at 11:30 – and we were still fairly early.

but all that happens, happens for a reason. on the way to milford sound (which is a town all of 100 people large), we saw a hitchhiker, and as usual i said “lets pick him up!” and for the first time oleg said “alright”. this is how we met mark, a very ambigously aged and definitely sporty looking hiker from uk. upon further conversation it turned out that he worked in the statistics department in a university, and was over 30 – neither one of us would give him a day over 26. he turned out to be a great person, and took great interest in us going sea kayaking, as he only had one day in milford sound and wanted to take some kind of non-touristy tour as well.

as fate would have it, one spot was left on our trip, which he promptly booked, and thus there were 7 of us going on this trip.

at 2:30 two rugged and adventurous looking guys, who turned out to be rosco and tex (rosco being the owner of the company, if you can call it that – i’d call it an experience or a party, company sounds too official), and tex would would be our guide for the day. they both immideately reflected an ownership of a great sense of humor, and had me worried with their statements of “its a rough looking day, so we’ll have ourselves an adventure” (or something to that effect). thankfully, i chickened out about bringing my d70 with me about 10 minutes earlier as i was looking at the water and the wind, so they couldn’t really convince me to take less with me at this point (i did take the sd500 with me, and i’m glad i did!). another point of interest is that i was the only girl amoung 7 guys – 1 being the guide, and the other 6 being 22 – 35 old guys. honestly, that kind of worried me, as i suddenly visualized currents, sea waves and dragons plunging out of the deep and me trying to defend myself with a paddle and my camera.

after that segue i realized that not a single travel agent was worried about my paddling ability, and more worried about my swimming ability. i knew that dry bags are provided for our stuff, so as long as i was reasonable about attaching the dry bag to something that wouldn’t sink, in worst case i’d get wet, and i can definitely live with that.

we got driven to the departure point, where we all got handed quick dry clothing. it was a pretty funny sight as all the guys had to wear these legging like things :) (me too, but i’m not as bothered as i had a long fleece covering me). we all got 2 layers of quick dry clothing, then a waterproof jacket, a life jacket, and a “skirt” for the kayak (its a rubber .. skirt .. that you pull over the hole in which you sit, essentially waterproofing the raft). upon dressing ourselves quite stylishly so, we got some quick instruction with how to hold and handle the paddle (oleg and i were the only ones who never were in a kayak before, and its not even that true for oleg who said he had been in one once previously. thus i was not only the weakest one, but also the most complete noob!), and off into the boat we went.

at this point, as all our stuff was inside the dry bag, the only thing i was worried about is how will i get from the boat into the kayak without killing myself and breaking both boats as well. but, again i put faith in the experience of the leader, figuring that he had to deal with clumsy cases like i before.

the boat ride out into the sound was … bumpy. and awesome fun. it also broke my found raybans (a screw got lost – i have both parts and will repair them as soon as i remember to just buy an eyeglass repair kit). the boat is very powerful, and so it bounced on the waves like there’s no tomorrow – making all of us bounce within it! it was just awesome, especially when i saw a waterfall and went “oh my god!” and pointed and the driver turned to look at me with a worried “oh shit its too fast for the girl” experession. i think they were both worried that i can’t handle it, but, geez, don’t they realize skydiving was more extreme than some boat ride? ;)

the part i was most worried about went seamlessly – mark and oleg went in one boat, and i went into the guide’s boat. i figure he might as well have to suffer my lack of skills, and generally it would be fun to meet more people on the trip.

after figuring out that the kayak won’t tilt if i take a deep breath, we all gathered together and got our general and informative instructions from tex as to what to do in case he “falls asleep”, in case we overturn, and how to get into steady formation with the rafts in case of rough weather, and we headed off into the direction from which we just came.

the total distance back to the “camp” – aka point of our departure (we still had a 2 hour drive to manapuri, the town at which we were staying) – was 12-14 kms (tex said 15 in the start, and then 12 at the end, but i don’t know when did he sound more sure). after paddling 3 of those kms, we came to my personal highlight of the trip – huge, tall, fresh waterfall.

underneath which we actually went.

twice.

in a kayak.

i cannot transfer into words the amazingness of this experience. at first had to wait a bit while cruise ships went in, held for a few minutes to let tourists snap off photos, and then went out, while we were just hanging by the side. when there was a break in the cruise ships, tex asked me if i want to go underneath, and i just couldn’t believe the fact that it was possible. the way that the rock underneath the waterfall is formed, you can actually squeeze the boat into a small crevice right underneath, and the water just COVERS you. the noise, the power, the freshness (yup, the water is indeed chilly), and the sheer raw power of this experience is mindblowing.

the others quickly followed suit, entering the same crevice. i snapped off a bunch of photographs of oleg and mark coming up to the waterfall (see above), and one particular photograph came out awesome, in terms of reflecting how surreal the experience is (and another one shows how tiny the boats are compared to the waterfall). after i was done, tex suggested we go under again, this time from a different angle, and off we went.

the difficult thing about being in the front of the boat with the guide is that on one hand i’m supposed to be the navigator, but on the other its the freaking guide and instructor – it seems like he should know these waters like the back of his hand. anyway, after i mildly quiestioned if we are going in too far from the left (he said not to go from the left), we safely went underneath yet again – except this time it was impossible to get as close due to the sheer wall of air and water that prevents you from getting underneath it head-on.

the quickdry clothing proved to be quickdry, and the waterproof skirt and jacket proved to be indeed waterproof – even against a waterfall.

after that mindblowing experience, the next few kms of kayaking flew by in pleasant conversation with tex (who definitely leads an awesome and unique lifestyle that most people don’t even get the chance to hear about, let alone experience), and new views and experiences. we saw mirtre’s peak (a huge mountain in milford sound), an overhang off which some crazy girl did a base jump for a video once (can’t remember the name, but the overhang sticks out about 5 meters deep into the water – definitely impressive), had lunch with the local seagull, seymore (i’m still not sure if its even possible to have a local seagull, but it was indeed only one seagull who seemed pretty confident about landing on the kayaks), and generally enjoyed the surrounding areas – nature, right there. it was so much right there that not only we saw a seal sleeping on the shore (he ignored us quite successfully), but for a little while there was a seal swimming right behind oleg and mark’s raft (they thought i was joking when i said “uuhm, guys, you have a seal behind you”).

the second mindblowing part of the trip came when the waves picked up and we got to try out surfing with the kayaks. basically the idea is that you catch a wave with the kayak by catching up to a big wave, and once the speeds are equalized you can ride it for a while – sending a great arc of spray to all sounds – the bigger the wave, the longer and bigger the arc. tex was awesome in this area as i didn’t have the strength to paddle fast enough and he actually caught us up mostly on his own a few times. the first time we rode a wave it was just insane, because after the amazingness and excitement of the actual ride the boat slows down and sinks into the wave. as i saw the entire kayak going entirely underwater, i thought “alright, here we are going down”. as i could feel the raft starting to sink underneath me (at this point the camera was with oleg ;) ) and i prepared for the consequences, the wave moved on, the air in the raft pushed it out and we lifted back to the air. it was definitely a one of a kind moment. (to my defense, i wasn’t overreacting as tex admitted too that he thought we’ll overturn). unfortunately the strength of the wave messed up everything attached to the nose of the raft, so i had to kind figure out how to fix everything back in a way that wouldn’t kill me if i tried to paddle. i was semi successful.

pretty soon after catching the waves, we entered the river’s mouth and soon after that we arrived back to the departure point. after an exchange of emails, names, and urls with tex and mark we all went our seperate ways, but hopefully not for the last time.

this day was far more full of excitement and new experiences than this text can convey. i can only testify to the fact that my muscles hurt for the next 4 days, but that my memories will last a lifetime!