I had heard about a couple of kayakers paddling the North Irish Sea crossing from Ireland to Scotland. I started to map out a crossing, researching the tides, winds and swells in that part of the world.
I was stunned to realise that the tide drops 9 meters per day, in Australia we see a tide drop of about 1 meter. This extreme tide drop causes tidal flow in the ocean and to paddle against it would be extremely difficult. I needed to work out the speed/pace we would paddle and how to use the tide. This would determine our starting set off time.
I met my friend Mark in Port Patrick, Scotland, I had the double surf ski and we had a local fisherman and his boat to escort us. The wind was coming from the West, so we loaded the surf ski onto the boat and drove several hours to Belfast, Ireland. We arrived with some time to chill, we were only in our paddling gear so only ventured to the local cafe.
Off we set... ready for an adventure, we were making great time and looking to break the current record of 4 hours and 7 mins. For the first half of the paddle we aimed 2km off course to the right, so the second half we would paddle in that same direction and the tide would bring us back to the destination of Port Patrick, Scotland. We missed it by 500m, so the last 500m we paddled into a fast moving tide and bloody hell it was hard work, but we made it in 3 hours 53 mins!
We finished and in the port of Port Patrick a crowd had gathered, what we didn't know is that our boat Captain lined up a local radio station and newspaper to run a story on us. Two Aussies making the North Irish Sea crossing on a surf ski.
I was there hugging Scottish locals and doing interviews on local radio, even though I could hardly understand them and they found it hard to understand me, but I was loving the moment.
At that moment my friend Mark decided to tell me that he had a flight booked out of Edinburgh in 4 hours, it was a 3 hour 30 min drive. With the pedal to the metal and probably several speeding tickets later we made it there in 2 hours 50 mins and he made the flight.
I was now in Edinburgh with a surf ski on the roof, wondering what I was going to do next....