The toilet snooze

Yesterday I woke up quite early but still felt pretty knackered from the heat and 6 straight days of paddling. I did some shopping for food and then went for cafee to a pub by which I carefully parked my kayak the previous day. And as I went to the toilet and sat down I fell asleep. After a little power nap I decided that it is time to rest for the day and I just slept in a shade, under a boat, next to my kayak, on a slipway by the pub on the beginning of the bridge which was new with a shop on the other side.

The following day I decided to set of really early at 3.32 exactly I was woken up by a combination of my horrible alarm and a screaming crow who was jamming with a seagull. I managed to snooze the alarm but the bloody birds were out of reach and I had no spare shoe. It was beautiful morning and great paddle with not much heat. As it was 6 oclock and I was paddling already I heard a cock doing his morning singing ritual and I just said to myself “You are late you lazy sod “.

The mountains and Achill Island looked spectacular in the morning haze and I was floating in crystal clear aquarium looking at the seaweed crabs and fish.

Luckily with the rising heat came head wind so it cooled me down and the paddling felt good. The wind picked up a bit and the chop came.

I really like how Quantum goes through the waves ant pretty much does not slow down and just keeps gliding through the waves the sensation of speed in head wind is something I really like even if it is just optical illusion.

I switched on my internal jukebox and started singing. In other words kind of voodoo sounds and jungle screams and I actually think I am pretty good at this and if I went public with my collection many people would pay me to shut up...

Anyway I was in the boat for 8 hours now and the last time I got out was 6 hours ago so I decided to pull up on a slipway and go for a kip. It was just 2 pm an I had my mileage pretty much done but today I wanted to do at least 70 km. Unfortunately the wind picked up to f5 headwind and tide was against me too.

I was hoping it is gonna drop down in the evening and I will be able to do at least 12 km to the next possible landing by night but it did not happen the wind stayed like that for the rest of the day and forecasted like this till the morning.

As I pulled in the harbour I got to talk to couple of fishermen and I learned that lobsters can live up to 100 years and that if I get my finger in the claw they will snap it clean off.

Tonight is first time after six nights when I am gona sleep in my tent and that is just because of the wind.