Tower Hamlets Canoe Club

No coaching planned for 16th December

Dan Abel — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 12:52:00 GMT

Our Christmas Paddle is on the 16th December. It is expected that all coaches will want to join in and so nobody will not be coaching on the basin.

If you hold 1 or 2 star awards you cannot paddle on the basin without a qualified coach. So signing up for the Christmas Paddle is a must!

Xmas party tickets on sale from Tuesday 18th November

Susi_Farnworth — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 21:06:00 GMT

Tickets for the canoeing social event of the year will go on sale from next Tuesday 18th November from Susi upstairs at the Prospect of Whitby. Further details will follow in the social events section before Tuesday.

Peveril Point tide race and the Purbeck coast: 11 & 12 Oct 08

nickJ — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Sean, Saturday morning: Jon, Pete, Dimitris, Liz, Gavin, Steve and Nick.

This visit to a tide race was perhaps a milestone in the club’s sea kayaking journey. Despite two paddlers dropping out it was our second trip in a row with 8 paddlers. I think this is a measure not only of the growing number of sea paddlers but also of our increasing ability and confidence.

The seed for this trip was planted in miserable mid August, ignored for a month then nurtured to fruition in unexpected, October glory. The forecast looked good and stayed good. We had light winds, a little swell and abundant sunshine.

Jon volunteered to tow the trailer with his van, so on Friday evening 7 of us loaded up and drove to Tom’s Field (camp site) in Langton Matravers, 3 in his van and 4 in Sean’s Achtungwagen. At the local pub several of the group contracted a mild bout of Whitewateritis, thus delaying the next morning’s early start. No matter; it gave Liz time to arrive, fresh from Portsmouth and the Brittany ferry (but still with he usual two surfboards and bicycle). Steve helped put up her tent badly (Whitewateritis again?) then we drove to Swanage and parked conveniently beside the beach.

My original aim for this weekend was to concentrate on working in a tide race, doing all the things we’ve practiced on the basin and elsewhere, but in rougher, moving water, with the opportunity for surfing and play. For variety we’d try to add a short coastal tour with the chance for exploration and maybe some rock-hopping.

I should stress that whatever our plans, we took liaison with the Coastguard (at Portland) and with the local coast Watch station very seriously. It only takes one member of the public, or a dutiful but uninformed lookout to raise the alarm when they see a kayaker out of his boat...

SATURDAY

My Saturday plan was to launch soon after the beginning of the ebb (about 09:00), and play in the race as it grew in strength, and hopefully as we grew in confidence. After two or three hours and a break for lunch, we could make a short coastal tour west, using the last of the ebb, then the start of the flood to return to Swanage. But because of our slow start the race would have been running for 2 hours when we reached it, i.e. 90% full strength; maybe a bit of a shock for those new to tide races! It would also leave us little time for a tour, so we planned a longer trip along the coast with a relaxed lunch at Chapman’s Pool, (waiting for the tide to turn); about 15 miles in all. Race play would have to wait.

In Swanage Bay the water was smooth and from the beach we could see a textural change off Peveril Point, a mile away. So something was going on…and when we got there (10:50) it looked moderately big and bouncy, no doubt helped by the F3 wind over tide and the forecast 1.3m swell. As we headed uptide before turning to run down through the race, a small group of sea kaykers approached from the north. I headed over to compare plans. They were a local group (led by Mark Rainsley of ukriversguide.co.uk and recent book http://southwestseakayaking.co.uk/promotional-bumf/) heading west from Studland. As they had the luxury of a ‘shuttlebunny’ their destination was as far as they could comfortably paddle. We followed them into the race, perhaps too closely because they stopped to play and our two groups merged in a confusion of bobbing heads and flashing boats. Under less favourable conditions this could have been a problem but soon the groups separated, the locals moving ahead in the main stream and our group moving inshore, seeking the edge of the eddy (for use the next day) on our way to Durlston Head.

The race had been anything but a neat row of clean waves. Other sets were coming in at an angle, so it was classic rough water, sudden peaks and sudden troughs. Mark later said the race is ‘in a big swirling, surging eddy’; sounds about right!

At Durlston Head the coast rises to sheer cliffs and turns a sharp corner where there’s another race. The cliffs then run to Chapman’s Pool and on to Kimmeridge. The race was not really working, just swirly and bumpy and not on a par with Peveril.

We followed the cliffs close in and Gavin spotted a pergrine falcon perched low on the cliff. It took off, flying within thirty feet of us, smooth grey back, black ‘moustache’ and bright yellow feet, beautiful, unless you’re a smaller seabird. In the summer the sea is busy with guillemots, razorbills and even puffins, nesting on the cliffs, but now they were gone, replaced by climbers clustered on the cliffs’ cracks and ledges.

Along the way some of us expored a cave or two and for relief from the heat (overdressed!) I tipped into the water and waited comfortably while someone practiced emptying my boat.

Dancing Ledge (11:53) was busy with climbers, anglers and spectators. As we passed I saw a couple of mackerel landed as well as the long silvery eel-like form of a garfish (feeds on the same small fish as the mackerel, has a long, sharp ‘beak’ and bones go green when you cook it).

St Alban’s Head creates a tide race and overfall, locally second only to that at Portland Bill. As we would be approaching it at ebb + 4hrs I expected it to be ‘interesting’; but it wasn’t. Just the merest swirl to suggested what goes on there. Mark said the waves were 1.5m high when his group passed (at ebb +3ish?) and that on big tides they reach 2.5m. Hmmm.

The semi-naked lunch.

Our lunch stop was a sheltered bay backed by crumbly cliffs, the water flat and clear and full of weed. At one point someone cried out and we looked up to see Liz’s new Avocet heading out into the bay; the peculiar local tide having rerisen and floated it.

Liz and Pete quickly reclaimed it, but apart from that excitement we happily did nothing but eat and drink and laze in the sun until it was time to return on the flooding tide (1505).

From St Alban’s Head, beneath the gaze of the perched Coastwatch lookout, we paddled out to sea (120 deg) for ten minutes, instead of following the coast; partly to see if the race was more evident further out (too early, it wasn’t) and partly to catch a stronger tidal flow back to Anvil Point. Further out the swell was more evident; the sea was slight and we made good time, landing at the beach by our transport at about 1650. (If our return route was 7.5NM our average speed was 4.3knots, suggesting tidal help of about 1.3kts)

SUNDAY

We woke to dense fog, we ate breakfast in dense fog.

The lady in the shop said it would clear in an hour so, armed with this invaluable local knowledge, we drove to the beach. Visibility was at most 1NM. It was enough. We launched at about 1050 and after what some thought to be an overly cautious approach were playing by 1130 (ebb +2). The race seemed quieter than on Saturday – less swell and almost no wind. We were all buddied up and four of us acted as catchers, two in the eddy and two downstream as back-stops. The remaining four played; then we swaped around; we had 4 VHF radios between us that proved invaluable but not infallible. Although everyone had a buddy it didn’t stop paddlers becoming spread out (who’s that over there?). Understandably some players just wanted to concentrate on themselves and the water so a buddy was undoubtedly an encumberance. On the other hand, constantly having to be aware of another paddler is good training in itself.

An alternative arrangement was later suggested, where the players would be ‘contained’ by two catchers as side markers and two more as back-stops…

In planning I had cautiously allowed for two spotters on the cliff but conditions made this unecessary.

After a few minutes we had our first capsize and rescue following some exhilarating surfing up on the front of the race…exactly what we wanted! The race was acting at a level that made attention essential and play lively but not intimidating. We were lucky to have these benign conditions as well as the sunshine. The water wasn’t cold. That we were sharing it with fish was evident when various motor boats drifted down the race or sat in the eddy with anglers cathing mackerel and small bass.

After an hour or so people began to tire and by 13:00 several of us were ready for lunch – but if we took a break the race would be flat when we returned, so those with the energy played on. We’d done enough rescues so concentrated on rolling, self-rescue and of course more surfing and as we worked the race diminished.

We were off the water by about 15:00, the end of an interesting but all too brief weekend.

We need to get to know this race far better, how it changes with different winds and swell. Whilst it could certainly have its dangers it seems dependable and offers great opportunities for development, and FUN!

More work is needed to taking good action photos...so we’ll be back!

GENERAL TIDE INFO: Standard Port: Dover

West going ebb begins HW Dover -0:30

East-going flood begins HW Dover +5:30 (might be 6:00)

SATURDAY 11 OCTOBER SUNDAY 12 OCTOBER

HW Dover: 0921 BST                               HW Dover: 1002 BST
West-going Ebb begins       0851               0932
                                    +1        0951               1032
                                    +2        1051               1132
                                    +3        1151               1232 bold = peak flows
                                    +4        1251               1332
                                    +5        1351               1432
East-going Flood begins     1451               1532

or possibly 1521. 1602

A great team effort! so my thanks to all who contributed to this trip and made it such a pleasure.
Photos by Jon and Nick

Web site problems

Ian Higgs — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 15:58:00 GMT

Midnight Wednesday 22 October: I believe that all is now well again. Please let me know if you have problems...

Wednesday 15 October 2008: The web site is currently unable to add new users. (The system claims that the intended e-mail address is already in use.) I am working on the problem with the hosting organisation and also the software authors.

Existing users should not see any problems. Very sorry to all the new club members ...

Rollerdisco Night November 21st '08

Susi_Farnworth — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 19:29:00 GMT

If the words ‘whip out your spandex and leg warmers’ make you quiver with excitement then you are going to love this because we’re planning a THCC night out at Renaissance Rollerdisco on Friday 21st November. Check out my thread in the Social events forum for further details. Susi, THCC Social Secretary.

THCC Christmas Party date confirmed - Saturday 13th December 2008

Susi_Farnworth — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 13:02:00 GMT

THe THCC Xmas party is going to be held Saturday 13th December in the Prospect of Whitby pub. There will be food, there will be music, there will be games, there will be dancing and there might be a lot of other mayhem too! So put it in your diary. Further details to follow.

Susi

Social Secretary.

Invisible Essex. A Thames Triangle from Sheerness to Shoebury Ness, Southend & back. 27 September 2008

nickJ — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 10:24:00 GMT

Nick, Tony, Sean, Liz, Jon (Eeeles), Rob (Scott), Greg & Justin.

Foggy preparations at Barton's Point.

This was our first club trip repeating the triangular course that Tony, Sean and I did back in July, except this time the tides dictated that we paddle anti-clockwise on the ebb rather than clockwise on the flood. It was either that or paddle at night (watch this space!). We planned to launch at highwater, 1215. The forecast was for very light easterly winds (F2-3) and possibly poor visibility to start with.

We met at Shadwell for 0900 and were away by 0930. The drive to our launch at Barton’s Point (just east of Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey,) was an easy hour and a quarter, slowed only by mist, occasionally congealing to a pea-souper. Crossing the new high arching bridge onto the Isle of Sheppey the mist was gone and our expectations rose, but when we reached the coast we were back in the fog. We found the ramp up to the track along the top of the beach and parked close to Barton’s Point; visibility was around three hundred metres, beyond which everything merged into featureless grey. A foghorn sounded regularly somewhere to the east. Straight above us the sky was blue but the sun was a low opal disc with no wind to clear it. No bother, we had an hour and a half before our launch time.

Although I felt relaxed about paddling and navigating under these conditions we had to cross and re-cross two or three shipping lanes, being run down was a real threat. We continued our preparations, believing the fog would clear, but at 1200 it hadn’t so we used a mobile phone to speak to London VTS Woolwich, then VHF radio for the Thames sea reach VTS (Ch 69) and Medway VTS (Ch 74), whose approach channel we had to cross first. They couldn’t tell us when the fog would clear but said there was an outward-bound ship at Garrison Point. When quizzed they said it was moving at 7 knots. We could hear the ship’s horn away to our left; we calculated it should pass in about eighteen minutes. To save time we decided to launch and paddle towards the shipping channel, we’d use dead reckoning and a GPS waymark to tell us when to stop and wait for the ship to pass. By the time that was all organised we radioed again to check - the boat had already passed and we were fifteen minutes late. We could hear its horn ahead of us moving east. We pointed our bows towards 330 degrees and paddled out into the fog. Without the radio it would have been Russian roulette.

A welcome buoy.

Our navigational planning had been set during a brief Tuesday evening session during which, for simplicity’s sake, we had combined two adjacent tidal diamonds to draw our vector diagram. Jon had reworked the calculations more carefully at home, coming up with slightly different courses to steer, but we agreed to stick to our less refined plan to see how it worked. Between us we had 4 GPS devices; their ‘you are here’ capability was reassuring in the fog but they could also tell us how fast we were going and where we had been. If you’ve not paddled following a compass course worked out by using a vector diagram you might not appreciate what we were trying to do. It simply means we were following a compass course at a predicted speed, having calculated that the combined effect of that and the tidal stream would deliver us to our target; you point at A but you arrive at B. This counter intuitive process has its own drama and was accentuated by the fog, much of the time we could see neither A nor B!

So we set off unable to see the Essex shore. Buoys, big ships, sailing boats and a seal loomed up then melted away, but as we proceded the fog thinned and the sun eventually appeared. Buoys and the GPS confirmed that our planned course would not take us where we wanted to go. At that point we stopped paddling and let the GPS pinpoint our position and record the current’s speed and direction at that particular time – useful knowledge for future planning. The tide was considerably weaker than anticipated…partly our fault but also a limitation of tidal diamonds. As we were up-tide of our target the error was not crucial and we decided to continue on the set course until we reached the edge of the extensive shallows off Shoebury Ness (ascertained with a hand compass, by our being due east of a particular wreck) then simply head for the beach.

Essex ahoy! Shoebury Ness snack.

The presence of numerous jet skis didn’t spoil our lunch, which we ate in the sunshine, lounging against a south-facing sea wall. Five miles away the Kent coast was invisible, the estuary a sea. We re-planned our return leg using the tide speed recorded by the GPS on the way over and the 50%, 90% rule (which states the speed of the tide according to how many hours it is after slack water). It came out only two degrees different from the original plan. When we re-launched the tidal flow over the shallows was negligible so we headed straight for the end of Southend pier, the starting point for our return.

Straight for the pier... ...with oysters on.

Arriving there five minutes early we took a turn around it, looking at the anglers and tourists looking at us. It’s the only pier I’ve seen oysters attached to.

On our outward journey the sea had been disappointingly calm, but now the wind picked up a little and with wind over tide the sea became livelier. Once again our course (190 degrees) took us further up-tide than planned so we took a couple more GPS readings and made an estimated correction. The various buoys enabled us to fix our position even without the GPS and the tall chimney on the Isle of Grain was always there for a compass bearing. As we got close to, and then crossed, the Yantlet channel the current picked up noticeably and the GPS confirmed it was close to what we’d expected. Looking at the GPS record of our ground track afterwards, Tony noted that across the faster current our ground track pointed directly towards our destination (encouraging) and that elsewhere the tides speed was about half that of the main channel.

But it does mean what it says...

So, by hook and by crook we paddled towards the end of our trip. A mile and a half short of Barton’s Point we came across the three-masted wreck of the Richard Montgomery that we’d passed on the way out. Somehow we strayed in to the wreck’s exclusion zone and then lingered in its refuge as a huge ship colourfully piled with containers approached up the Medway channel.

As it passed we became aware of a high speed boat coming in our direction, the sort of high speed boat that suggests ‘Police’ or ‘Harbour Master’. This one had ‘Pilot’ on the side. It stopped and a tall man on the front deck beckoned me over…’Who’s in charge here?’ he asked. I wanted to point at someone else but it was a fair cop. He said we’d set off sensors and alarms and he’d been sent over to see what was going on. He was pleasant enough but we had been warned; the exclusion zone applies to all vessels, including ours. Somewhat chastened we paddled the last mile and a half back to Barton’s Point. The tide was out and the final walk offered a choice between indirect stony shore or direct mud. I made the wrong choice and when I corrected it the stony shore revealed itself as an extensive bed of large oysters.

So ended the second Thames triangle. During the exchange of emails that tends to follow the completion of such trip, when there is much yet to be resolved Rob commented on Tony’s GPS track of where we’d actually been, saying it looked a bit like a triangle, the sort his 4 year old draws. It’s a fair cop.

Pete, sorry you were unable to join us; see you next time!

Link to Tony’s GPS ground track

http://www.omode.co.uk/Content/ThamesTriangleTrack-2008-09-27.pdf

Photos by Nick & Jon

Web site has moved

Ian Higgs — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 08:57:00 GMT

The web site was moved to the new server during last night and everything seems OK so far.

Please let me know if there any any problems

Web site unavailable on Thursday evening

Ian Higgs — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 23:17:00 GMT

The Tower Hamlets Canoe Club web site will be unavailable on Thursday 25 September for several hours from 9pm.

The site is being migrated to a different server and any forum posts or page changes made after 9pm will be lost. I will post another message saying when this is complete.

Basin Access this weekend (22nd August)

yatesy — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 10:14:00 GMT

Roz is away as of this Saturday and Mike is in [wikipedia:Wales] until Saturday evening so any kit needed this weekend must be arranged for Friday evening.

Thanks,

Paul

Buoyancy Aid Cupboard

yatesy — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 15:33:00 GMT

All,

Please ensure that all buoyancy aids are put away at the end of the evening in the cupboard, in the correct place and that they are clipped and zipped!

Thanks,

Paul (Equipment Officer)

Thames Triangular Trip: 26 July 2008

nickJ — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 13:56:00 GMT

Barton’s Pt ([wikipedia:Sheppey]) to Southend Pier, the defence boom & back. 13.7NM

Nick the Younger, Tony Roberts and Sean Foo.

With an acute inclination to spend the maximum time paddling and the minimum time driving I’ve been on the look out for interesting opportunities close to home. This is the latest.

While the Solent and Isle of Wight offer spectacular scenery with challenging tides and races, the seaward reaches of the Thames estuary are closer to home (40 miles) but still offer wide open spaces and the need for cross-tide planning but relatively little risk to life or limb.

The trip follows a triangular course, starting near Sheerness on the Isle of [wikipedia:Sheppey] crossing diagonally to Southend (the pier is a great landmark), turning east along the Essex coast to the end of an old anti-submarine boom and then back to the starting point.

As with many previous trips I planned a route and made initial calculations, which Tony then reviewed. His suggestions included setting out an hour later (at HW -5hr) to give more tide help and deeper water over the shallows of Southend’s extensive beach, and a minor route amendment to let us visit the ‘dangerous wreck’ of the S.S.Richard Montgomery, a WWII ship loaded with explosives. Both ideas were instantly adopted!

We met by Barton’s Point (at east end of concrete sea wall - unload boats on tapering tarmac by end of wall; parking over the road & possible camping?) and launched at 1345, HW -5. The forecast was ridiculously fine, hot, rather cloudy and with only F2 winds. Perfect for an initial assessment of the route without distracting factors. More challenging conditions would be welcome another time.

Instead of paddling along the coast I’m currently enjoying paddling out on a compass bearing, with my target visible but in a different direction; you just have to trust your calculations and the tide. This is what I need to get better at and Tony had set his new GPS to track our course so we could later compare where we’d actually been with where we’d planned to go. The Thames here is not a single uniform channel but comprises the main channel of varying depths with a branch off to the Swale and Medway. To make things more interesting there are two or three shipping lanes (the deeper sections), extensive shallows and plenty of buoyage and other marks that help with navigation. Tidal streams vary in speed and direction across the estuary. As a kayaker the tidal diamonds rarely provide quite the information you want and here is no exception – the art is blending the available information, including what you find on the day and filling in the gaps with some inspired guessing.

Before reaching the wreck, 1.5NM offshore, it we knew we were ahead of schedule, paddling at about four knots. That gave us ten minutes to inspect the wreck’s three masts, rough slanting crosses encrusted with mussels, encrusted with barnacles, with the tide swirling past at about a knot. The next leg was across to the pier, 4.3NM, and I doggedly stuck to my course despite it being clear that we were faster, and the tidal stream less than anticipated. After about three miles Tony asked us how deep we thought it was…then stuck his paddle in to reveal a depth of 1.5m – his GPS having told him we’d just reached the shallows that dry at low tide, a mile offshore. We headed to the beach away from the pier and its crowds and their banging music (audible two or three miles across the water). There was little apparent flow over the shallows and again we were ahead of schedule as we landed on the gently shelving beach of sand and shingle. It was 1516 hr, (HW -3:30)

After tea we simply followed the coast east, past terraces of colourful timber beach huts and through a flotilla of moored boats, each facing the gentle southerly breeze, until we reached the wooden jetty at Shoebury Ness. Twenty teenagers were standing at the end, watching each other taking running jumps. From this point the end of the anti-submarine boom was visible, a string of clustered concrete piles, and we simply aimed straight out for it.

To make navigation on the return crossing more interesting I’d planned to follow one course to an anchorage shown on the chart (over half way) and then to follow a new course back to Barton Point, our start, but now I realised that at the wreck we’d forgotten to look to see how the anchorages were marked on the sea and that from the journey so far they simply weren’t marked. Apart from dead reckoning we had no way of telling when we reached this crucial elbow so decided to follow a single bearing back to our start. I simply averaged the bearing of the two planned courses and we headed homewards on 185 degrees.

The sea was flat and at one point splashes of water started popping out of the glassy calm. We stopped paddling to see what was going on and found ourselves in a shoal of silver fry, throwing themselves into the air in an attempt to escape the bass or mackerel that were driving them to the surface. Again we were way ahead of schedule and following our extemporised course found ourselves back very close to the wreck; too far west. Our course had been wrong and the tidal stream was clearly stronger than expected (we were ahead of time) and our faster paddling had only exagerated the inacuracies of my tidal information and plans. Tony’s GPS later revealed this graphically and when I reworked the calculations at home the new course seemed to be supported by what the GPS recorded.

At 1815 (HW -0:30) we landed carefully back at Barton’s Point amidst an angling competition.

The trip had been a success and is one I intend to repeat under different conditions. The tides were approaching neaps so could have been far more challenging – springs would have shown up the errors in my vector diagrams even more.

This could be an excellent club trip for those wanting to paddle a little further from the shore and to learn or practice some navigation…or simply to visit Southend and the longest pleasure pier in the world !

Photo to be added when Sean returns from N.Uist.

New Chairman Election Coming Tuesday, 22 July

Anne Knudtzon — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 09:24:00 GMT

As announced earlier, an Extraordinary General Meeting is taking place this Tuesday 22nd of July, 21:00 in the Prospect of Whitby. (In the private functions room upstairs).

Agenda: Chairman Election

BBQ Tuesday 15th July

Susi_Farnworth — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 21:58:00 GMT

Cathy will be running a BBQ next Tuesday 15th July. The formula is the same as always - £5 will buy you tons of flesh and bread and two beverages. Food + drink available from 8.30pm.

Cathy would really appreciate any help setting up the BBQ as she is currently going to be doing this on her own (although Gary is very kindly doing the shopping).

It should be great - be there or be square.

Susi