Anything but plain sailing

Looks like we spoke too soon!

We took the duck to the sea again today (thanks once again to those kind folks at Southsea Canoe Lake) and it didn't quite go as smoothly as the first trial.

As the wind had picked up, the sea had become considerably rougher than our first practice. This didn't cause a major problem in itself and the duck coped well, however we started to take some water on board and handily had left the buckets in the car!

We decided to turn and head back for the beach, upon doing so we realise the tide had taken us much further down Southsea beach than we had realised and well past the pier. It soon became apparent that we wouldn't be able to go back against the tide without being smashed against the pier, we therefore took the coward's way out and headed back towards dry land. As we reached the beach, the breakers from the waves allowed us no time to push the pedalo onto the beach and it was completely full of water, sand and shingle within a few seconds.

I'm not sure if you've ever thought about trying to move a pedalo which is full of water, let me save you the trouble, you can't! We couldn't bail out the water as it was stuck on the edge of the breakers and water was constantly washing over the pedalo.

So, 2 hours later, once the tide had gone out, we were finally able to rescue the duck and return her to her slightly calmer home of Southsea lake.

So, roll on June 6th, any volunteers to help us pull the pedalo out the water?!

The duck hits the sea

As we get ever closer to the event, we thought we'd better take our duck to sea to ensure that she was in fact seaworthy and wouldn't sink within 5 metres of our departure.

So a few weeks ago Captain Bossy and First Mate Nalder dragged our trusted pedalo from it's home on the Southsea canoe lake, across the road and down the steep shingle beach at Southsea. We pushed her into the sea, climbed aboard, started to pedal, then after about 5 minutes, realised that we's forgotten our lifejackets, so returned to dry land to retrieve these!

She handled the sea admirably, albeit that it was a very hot day with no wind whatsoever and the sea was extremely calm, although it has to be said we got nowhere near the shipping lane itself which will cause the most severe and challenging conditions of our event.

The video summary of our training day is online here , make sure you turn up the sound!

We always knew the event would capture the public's imagination and this was confirmed when it seemed that everyone suddenly stopped and turned to watch as these two madmen approached the beach on a giant duck.

We must also give a huge thanks to the kind gentleman who helped drag the pedalo back up the shingled dunes as it became apparent that we were struggling. If any of you are in Southsea on Sunday morning (26th April), we may well need the same assistance for our final sea trial before the event.