SUP Club – 28th May 2014
Although the weather hasn’t been the prettiest this week, last night’s SUP Club saw some of the best conditions we’ve had on a Wednesday evening all year. Sure, it was overcast, but the forecast drizzle held off … and more importantly there was absolutely no wind, which made for totally glassy water and some joy paddling. A 7.30pm low tide (of 0.58m) meant Two Tree Island was on, and we launched around 7pm to head east down the Ray towards Seal Point. Thirteen paddlers covering a wide range of experience (kudos to Steve and Mika who had only just completed our learn to SUP course last weekend!) cruised c. 5km out to the dogleg where we were greeted by Southend’s resident seal colony…
A revered silence fell across the group as we knelt or laid prone on our boards and kept our distance from the seals at first. With a couple of pups on the sand, it was especially important to have some respect for their territory. Maintaining the hush, we drifted closer on the glassy waters, allowing the seals to check us out from the shore and play around our boards in the water. We’ve had worse evenings!
Commune with nature done, we headed back home aided by a building flood tide and the lightest of south-easterly breezes. Cutting through the mirror-flat water, we were back to the slipway in no time and packing up for a well-earnt post paddle pint in the Smack after some 10km of paddling. Thanks again to everyone for a magic SUP Club – see you again next week…
If you fancy joining SUP Club, all we ask is that you have some paddling experience (if not, check out our SUP Lessons) – we call Wednesday SUP Club on the day on our Facebook page and Wet’n’Dry SUP calendar, location depending on weather and tide conditions. If you have your own kit, just turn up and you’ll be very welcome. If not, we do offer limited SUP hire for £25.