The Bay Ice started breaking up this week and I had been watching for an opportunity to get out and push some Ice with the kayak. The weather forecasting has not been very accurate this week. Saturday was looking good on one day, and then changing to rain, wind and back again to less chance of rain on another.
The forecast rain for Saturday went south of us and we ended up with sun, 50 degree temperatures and 15 to 20 mph winds from the SE.
Rich and I met at Sunset Park where the ice had cleared from the beach.
There was a pretty large ice shove at the N end of the park, so we headed there first, bumping up to the ice and lying alongside.
Further north, the ice pack loomed. It had one small open lead which we ventured into about 100 feet before it closed up.
The whole pack was drifting at several mph and we were leery of getting caught if the lead suddenly closed up. We didn’t stay there long, but pulled out and paddled south along the ice packs edge.
There were several channel marker buoys being pushed under as the moving ice ran them over.
The red buoy going under
My old Selkie was great for running up onto the ice as the bottom was almost flat. It was a blast to take a hard run at an ice shelf and slide up completely out of the water. My current boat, a Sirius has a strong v-bottom and running upon the ice is not so fun, the boat will just layover...better to stay in the slush.
Crushed Can Buoy
Up close we could see that the green can buoy was significantly crushed, I was impressed!
Our trip rounded out by going to the Oregon Street Bridge then back along the shipyard. Most of the winter fleet has left, just the Walter McCarthy…in the graving dock, the Saginaw, John J Boland and the American Courage are still here. The Tug Mary Page Hannah was in the small graving dock and a Roen Salvage barge was in the floating dry-dock with sections of the bottom being replaced
Ore Carrier Saginaw
Roen Salvage Barge in floating Dry-Dock
It was a great to be paddling again, the sun was warm and the ice exciting.
There was a kayaker's pot luck that evening.
A nice way to end the day.
