Day 86 Coral Bay, WA

Is there anything more relaxing than being near water?  If there is I would love to know about it.  Yesterday we decided to launch the kayak today but the wind was so strong at nine o'clock that we almost decided against it but by ten o'clock the wind had dropped to a more pleasurable pace.  We walked down to the waters edge just to make sure that we were doing the right thing as there is nothing worse than trying to paddle in strong wind and currents.  The water looked pretty good so back to the van to pull the kayak out of storage and inflate it.  Philip did all the hard work while I was inside prepping lunch.  I knew we would be ravenous by the time we arrived home.  Vegetarian meal for us today.  Homemade Curried Tomato Soup and a Pumpkin & Feta Pastry.

Once we had loaded the inflated kayak on to the back of the Toyota it was just a short drive to where we could launch it.  We found the perfect spot just metres from the beach and as it was high tide we could launch the kayak in shallow water.  The kayak is not really heavy to carry, just awkward. 

There were lots of people with the same idea as us and there is a kayak hire place at Coral Bay that seems to do a roaring trade.  Most people were content to stay in the bay vicinity as were we, although we decided to paddle to the southern most point of the bay that was probably four or five kilometres from our starting point.  We paddled leisurely as we wanted to explore what was in the water below us.  We paddled through the Shark Nursery area but didn't see any of the reef sharks that frequent this area.  Crocodile's are certainly behind us now, thank goodness. Coral Bay is situated just below the Tropic of Capricorn. 

 We didn't quite make it to the very end point of the bay and had to turn back around 100 metres from it because the current, as it surged around the point, was very strong and neither of us felt like the struggle.  Once we had turned around the current pushed us quite rapidly back the way we had come.  It was leisurely for a short while before the wind (that was at our back heading south) was now a head wind as we paddled north.  We kept as close to the shoreline as possible where the sand dunes gave us a small degree of protection from the wind.

It was a terrific paddle and I'm so pleased we decided to push ahead with it this morning.  I'm writing this blog a little earlier today because this evening we want to head down to the beach for sunset and then maybe check out the tavern after the sun sets.  Tomorrows weather forecast has a warning for strong winds so we are going to go for a drive to check out what is in the vicinity and maybe head to the bush camp area that we intend staying at on Saturday.

This is a very short GoPro video of our morning on the water.