The last day is Saturday

The last few days I really try to eat a lot and not just spam and mash potato but something more filling like burger or pizza. I have been going nonstop for 11 days and today is the last one and it will be ugly. The forecast is force 4 gusting 5 and increasing later to f5 gusting 6.

And of course right in my face all day but to be honest I could not be bothered less I would just drag the kayak to the finish line if I needed to. Barbora said she made a cake and I told her to book the ferry for 2 in the morning so the game was on.

I used my super duper roll bag and got Quantum 300 meters to the water on few pulls and set off for 45 km slog determined to snail it to the finish.

The wind was pretty strong and I felt like having  my head in wind tunnel. Err the noise that is one thing I never figured out how to get rid off. Hat helps a bit but not much.

Anyway my watch showed me speed of 5.6 km so I was quite pleased with that and calculated that it is gonna be around 10 hours on the water with breaks or so.

I was just hugging the coast and watched the holiday makers and dog walkers and kept digging in my snail pace. It was pretty hard work but the vision of no more smelly kit on me and seeing Barbora and the cake was pretty good motivation so I just put my head down and got on with it.

As I was paddling I could see flashing paddles in the distance, that cheered me up and I hoped I will chat to some seakayakers on the way. As I got closer I could see the paddler has got pretty quick cadence so I thought hmm surfski catching runs hmm! The conditions were ideal for it but not in my direction. At the end it was a dude on a sit on top  kayak heading into the blue waving his hand and holding the paddle upside down and I thought Christ sake the last thing I wanna do is to be saving someone this day. Anyway I approached the guy and as I got next to him I asked “Are you all right mate?” and he told me that he was ok just struggling into the wind a bit. He looked relaxed and was not too far from the shore I advised him that if he gets closer to the land he will make better progress there is gonna be less chop and he replied “you are probably right” and turned in and I went on.

As I went maybe a km down I noticed fisherman in a little boat and I approached him hoping he is not gonna get scared as fishermen usually do when silently approached by a kayak.

As he lifted his head from the pots he just jumped and said “fuck man you scared the shit out of me”.

Fishermen are jumpy creatures though.

Anyway I told him about the guy and explained him that I think he is happy there but probably does not know what is he doing much and if he could just keep an eye on him if he gets safely to the shore to which he agreed and I kept on digging and taking breaks now and then. 

And in mean time I would stop my watch and reset the timer. It is quite frustrating to see on the display how many hours I was digging and how long it takes. So I would start from zero after every break and just focus on the next headland or rest place. I broke the day into really small bits and it kind of helped and I just sailed through the day.

Looking back was quite good moral boost and I just told myself you might go slow Pete but done some distance today. moral was good. As I got to the last headland I started to see Howth the place I set of from 6 weeks ago. It was the finish line so I stuffed my face with last of biscuits and went for the last stretch across the bay. The wind went down and it got calm and I was gliding on the surface in a snail pace because the tide turned against me haha.

The wind the creature I called all names in all languages I know decided to play the last trick on me, it turned around and started blowing my direction just so little that it created tiny ripples which were moving the same speed as my kayak so one completely looses the sense of speed. So I just gazed at my watch and looked at the speed there to believe that I am moving forward. As I paddled into the harbour I went to the slipway I started from month and half back and touched it and switched the watch off and recorded the last bit of the loop on my gps watch.

Above the slipway was Paul who was the first guy to see me in Ireland and he was the first one to see me to finish and he congratulated me and I told him “bloody finished  Paul now I can go somewhere not so hot and dry”.

What I did not expected was that there was a delegation of seakyakers. so after I offloaded the kayak and put it on Dave’s car (the highest seakayaker in Ireland ) we got into great chat. It was great meet guys with the same interest and talk what I call kayak porn.

Then Paul and Dave took me to the ferry and I was off to my amazing woman and tail wagging dog Khumbal.

It did not set in yet “I circumnavigated Ireland” but now I am just glad it is over. I think it is gonna take couple of days before I realise what I have just done and I will be able to reflect.

The journey is finished but not the blog I wanna talk why I did it and what I learned about Ireland. But now I need rest and reflect so stay tuned.