On the fourth day the storm finally relinquished its grip, and the early morning twilight was filled with the sound of tweaking birds and the shy red squirrels finally felt confident enough to come out of their tree nests to check on the nut feeders in Dave's backyard.  “You don’t see them on the Mainland very often. Only here on the Isle of Wight.”

 

“Really? How come?” I asked.

 

“They’ve been outcompeted by the American Grey Squirrel. They aren’t as fussy when it comes to food so they get bigger and outbreed the red squirrel. A few years back, someone claimed they spotted a grey squirrel in the ferry coming over from Southampton. The captain immediately turned around midway, and the ferry was fine-combed until the little blighter was found and removed.”

 

After seeing one of the red squirrels precariously hanging off the nut feeder and only after great  difficulty managing to get one of the prized pine nuts, I concluded that the chubby American grey squirrels are more witty, and quick on their feet. In Miami I’ve even seen them steal a french fry from an unattended plate, and they have no qualms scavenging through a trash dumpster. They are rats with puffy tails.

 

I was on water in the first half hour of the flooding tide, with just enough time to paddle out through the western entrance of the Solent without much difficulty. My goal was to stay close to the island until reaching the Needles where I had hoped to thread my way in between the stacks for some memorable photographs, but unfortunately even though the wind was calm the sea hadn’t yet settled, and the swells were roaring through gaps. I turned north toward the mainland, and after paddling through some bumpy swells breaking over a shallow underwater shelf, I continued the rest of the day along a series of white sandy beaches until the entrance to Poole Harbor, where Ian, a member of the Poole Canoe Club offered to let me spend the night at their club house and took me out for a drink with some of his friends.

 

“We’re getting some Chippies. Are you interested?”

 

“What’s that?” I asked

 

“Fish and Chips.”

 

“Ah, I’m up for it, sure.” I answered. After eight hours of paddling and eating nothing but cereal bars I felt eager for a hot meal.

 

“Great, we’ll go to the best one in Britain!” one of the chaps answered as we got into his car and drove off. In several towns I had paddled past I noticed the ubiquity of the local Fish and Chip shop. Every village, no matter how small, has at least one shop which is usually a humble establishment consisting of a counter or window to the street with few benches and tables next to a plastic board with a picture menu showing the options, portion sizes, and notes about common allergens like gluten and nuts. Almost always, you can smell the distinct aroma of deep fried fish in the air from a block away even before you see the shop, and if the place has a good reputation, there’s almost always a line of customers waiting outside during the lunch hour or in the evening as people make a stop over to buy a take away dinner. There was merit to the claim that the shop we were going to was a good one. The evening line was wrapping around the street corner, and the fried scent was wafting in the wind opening appetites.

 

Fish and chips is deeply ingrained into British culture. The first Friday in June is known as National Fish and Chips Day, and it has been a staple of the working class since the industrial revolution. During the War years Churchill referred to them as The Good Companions, as they were a morale booster during the German bombings and were one of the few foods exempt from rationing.

 

“Chippies are our national dish.”

 

“Isn’t it Chicken Tikka Masala? That’s what I heard,” I said with a smirk.

 

“Oh. Yeah, you’re right. Ha! We have two national dishes.”

 

When it was our turn to order, the cook was told that I was paddling around Britain and Ireland, and to which he said he’d throw an extra large piece of haddock in the fryer for me. That turned out to be a mixed gift. Either my stomach was not yet fully healed from the scuffle with Old Father Thames, or the British have evolved a unique gut flora capable of digesting exceptionally concentrated bouts of grease.

 

At the club house Ian was keen to go over the tidal charts for St Alban’s Head with me which I would be paddling through the next day. “Lots of people know about the tidal races around the Portland Bill, but I think that St Alban’s Head can be just as gnarly,” he said, flipping through the tidal chart. “Here’s the thing you need to know about St. Alban’s. There's a very shallow ledge just off the headland. In some places it’s barely ten feet deep, but it extends three miles offshore; when the tide is racing fast over, it makes some huge overfalls. However, there’s an inshore passage very close to the cliff base where the water is a little deeper, and the swells don’t break. If you stay very close to the cliff, you’ll avoid the worst of the overfalls.”

 

“How wide is the passage?”

 

“Maybe twenty-five meters wide, thereabouts. Motor boats do go through there, but it is kind of narrow.”

 

We looked at the tide and weather forecast. Low tide would be around 7:00 am, after which I would have the tide against me, but there would be a strong easterly gusting close to 30 mph.

 

“Oh, strong winds against the tide, it will get very hairy around the headland.”

“Have you ever paddled there in those conditions?” I asked.

 

“You mean on a day with a sustained Force 6 wind? Oh no. I definitely wouldn’t be out there on St Alban’s. But you certainly have far more experience than me.”

 

His caution sent very uncomfortable chills down my back. If the locals who paddle this stretch coast throughout the year had second thoughts, what business did I have to be out there? I did not want find myself having to call for a rescue after making an irresponsible decision, and I felt a pang in my stomach churned imagining the embarrassing the headlines on the local news, “American paddler attempting to circumnavigate Britain and Ireland nearly drowns after being warned not to paddle in obviously poor conditions.”

 

Nonetheless, I was also growing concerned at the overall pace of the journey. I had spent three days in Selsey waiting on the weather, and four days in the Isle of Wight. At the rate of one day paddling for every three or four landbound days, I would clearly never finish in time. I hope things improve in the spring and summer. In addition, the weather forecast and the tide for the morning on the following day would be ideal to paddle around the much tougher Portland Bill. If I didn’t go, I would miss my chance and be landbound there as well for who knows how long.

 

“What if I leave really early tomorrow? I mean super early, like before dawn? With a few hours of ebbing tide, and the wind on my back, I should pass the headland before the tide changes. After that there’s no more tidal races until the Portland Bill, right?

 

“Right. After St Alban’s the currents are weak, but it’s almost sixteen miles from here to the headland. Hmmm... It’s a bit of a stretch if you leave really, really early, you can get there close to low tide. You might have an hour or two before the flood tide really picks up speed. You better get some sleep.”

 

As far as I can remember, I’ve always been a light sleeper. Even when I am asleep, my eyes and ears stay attuned to the surroundings, and the slightest noise or flash of light is enough to jolt me. Any bothersome thoughts in my head, such as upcoming deadlines, an issue with a work project, or even something I might have heard or read on the news, will keep me awake at night tussling in bed from one uncomfortable position to another. Sometimes I will get up and walk to the kitchen to eat a biscuit or make a sandwich, not because I’m hungry, but because I need to try and distract my mind. 

 

Usually, one thing that works is to get myself as physically exhausted as possible; if the body is craving for rest, the mind eventually has to loosen its grip. Tonight, however, that grip was especially tight, and the exhaustion of the thirty five miles I had paddled the day before hardly seemed to matter when I contemplated what the challenge ahead would be like. I imagined the twenty foot waves I had seen crashing in St Catherine’s Lookout in the Isle of Wight, and was reminded of the anguish I felt the day I was due to sit for my Professional Engineering license exam. 

 

It will be just like the exam, a voice in my head said. The anticipation is the worst part. Once you sit at the desk, read the first question, and realize you can solve it, you start to breathe easier. 

 

“I don’t think it’s like the exam at all.” I said. “You don’t get to skip over a wave about to break on top of you like you can skip a question in the exam, try the next one, and go back to it later.”

 

Then you better be ready.

 

Somehow I must have fallen asleep, because as I heard the voice in my head say those words  I was jolted by the alarm clock on my phone. Time to get ready, I thought. Two hours later I had the kayak packed and on the water ready to go.

 

Before taking off, I took a few added precautions, most important of which were switching to the wider and longer Euro blade paddle for greater balance and stability, and secondly, avoiding drinking any liquids whatsoever. Peeing from a kayak is a stressful affair; you have to sit still and hold the paddle with one hand against your chest while you fiddle with the other to pull out your willy through the drysuit front zipper, and then somehow relax to let it flow. This is all the more difficult when the sea is choppy like a washing machine, and any one wave can splash a gallon of icy water into your pants, or worse, capsize you when you’re completely unprepared. The fear that something unforeseen could happen makes it more difficult to relax and let it flow, so the whole procedure lasts longer, which increases the risk that something bad could happen.

 

After I got the first few paddle strokes in I felt a bit more confident. Dusk was breaking, the winds seemed light, and the ferry running across the harbor didn't look like it was having a hard time in the chop. I covered the first four miles in record time as the ebbing tide pulled me along and spit me out through the harbor mouth like melon seed. From there on, things quickly roughened up. 

 

The first headland out of the harbor was a set of chalk cliffs and sea arches called Old Harry’s Head. In calmer weather it’s a lovely place to paddle slowly in between the narrow arch passageways and shinny white sea stacks with crystal clear water, but today, the low clouds and faint drizzle gave the famous cliffs a sad and dirty gray hue bathed in a muddy soup of brown foam. I kept my distance from the headland beyond the reach of the breakers, but it was a constant struggle against a progressively strengthening crosswind from the East that kept pushing me towards the rocks.

 

After clearing past the Old Harry’s Head the contour of the land turned slightly towards the Southwest which allowed me to ease a bit on the ferry angle and take a direct line towards the next series of headlands that included one menacing piece of bare rock called Anvil Point. In today’s conditions, the name could hardly have been more prescient. The swells battered the cliff face like hammer blows shaping a scorching slab of metal, while reflected waves coming back at me sometimes made the sea drop away from underneath the kayak as if I had fallen into a pothole on the road large enough to swallow a small car.

 

In the midst of the confusion, I lost the feel for how fast I was actually going. I had started paddling just after 5:00 am, and it had taken a little over a half hour to cover the four miles out of Poole Harbor, which led me to assume that I would cover the sixteen miles to St Alban's Head in just over three hours and be there a little after 8:30 am, one and a half hours after the start of the flood tide, before the onset of the worst conditions a 30 mile per hour wind pushing against a strong tide could create. I looked at my watch and saw that the time was 8:45 am.

 

“Oh, did I already pass St. Alban’s head without even noticing?” I said out loud. “That last bit was rough as hell. Maybe that was the ledge Ian had talked about, and I’m now in the clear.” 

 

I felt a momentary sense of relief, but it soon gave way to doubt. I stared at an enormous headland still at least five miles farther. Is that St. Alban’s Head? But the time says I already should be past it. I pulled out the GPS during a lull in the swell and confirmed my worst fears. I was behind schedule, most likely because the current was already flowing fast against me. I felt a sense of panic as if I was trapped in a room where the walls and roof were caving in. How will conditions be when I get there in another hour? If I turn back I’ll have to go through the dreaded Anvil Point again, and this time with the galing wind against me. The longer I took to decide, the worse both options would get. In the end, it required less mental exertion to double the effort and keep moving forward. The faster I paddled the less the wind would be biting my back, and the more control I could exert over the kayak. 

 

It was the right decision. Although it took another hour to arrive at St Alban’s, and six foot standing waves were exploding over the shallow ledge that stretched out to the hazy horizon, a narrow corridor of dark water skirted the base of the cliff as if Moses had parted a small sliver of the ocean for me to squeak through; it was the inside passageway Ian had mentioned. I gave a loud shout of thanks hoping that he could hear me somehow. Once I was behind the headland, I found a comfortable pocket of still wind and glass smooth water, a small oasis of quiet stillness wrapped in a cracking whip of furious sea. Time for a water break and wizz, I said relieved.

 

There were still another five hours of paddling, most of it against the current, to Portland, but the toughest part was now behind me. The six foot swells were rolling with the wind, and I could surf the kayak down the face of one wave before catching up with the one in front  and slide down the face of the subsequent wave. It was a kind of game to see how many waves could be strung together. When it worked, paddling was almost effortless and only a matter of adjusting the course, but if I failed to climb over the wave in front of me it felt like the kayak was moving backwards, and the wave in the rear would crash into my back like someone had just poured a bucket of ice cold water. This constant change between accelerating and sudden slowdown or bracing required constant awareness which after a few hours became both mentally and physically taxing especially when low clouds settled in and it became difficult to gauge whether I was even progressing as it was difficult to discern the changing features in the landscape. Only when I finally caught sight of the stone walls of the Portland Harbor did I know that I was close to the end.

 

Only those who have spent any length of time out in the open sea during a storm can appreciate what a magical experience of suddenly entering a safe harbor. It’s like arriving at an oasis shaded by a canopy of leafy trees after a long journey through the harsh and inhospitable desert. One is a place of struggle, and the other a place of peace, so different from one another, and yet they coexist next to each other. The moment I crossed through the breakwater into the wide open calm pool of the Portland Harbor, I breathed a sigh of relief. Finally, I can let my guard down. 

 

The moment I finally landed at the boat ramp of the Portland marina and stood up to stretch my legs for the first time in twelve hours felt like a momentous occasion. Normally I would have passed on the chance to have paddled in these conditions, feeling that they would have been beyond my abilities, and having made the decision to take off that morning and to have succeeded without issue was a big boost of confidence. Perhaps I do have the chops and I am worthy to be on this journey. I thought.

 

These feelings would soon be tested to a much higher degree.