New Brunswick / PEI Crossing

April-May 2006

This is an article from WaveLength Magazine, available in print in North America and globally on the web.
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by Joe O'Blenis

The winds gradually increased and the waves began to grow.

I’d been away for a few months on a cycling trip across Canada and now with summer winding down and the fall approaching, my mind was being drawn back to sea kayaking more and more. It was time for ‘The Crossing’. For the last couple of years, some members of our club, the Atlantic Kayak Association, had been talking about taking on the open water crossing from the New Brunswick coast on the mainland, to the red sandy shores of Prince Edward Island on the far side of Northumberland Strait.

In the end, two others were up for the challenge of the crossing with me: my Dad and our good friend Greg Steeves. Dad would be padding his wood strip sea kayak that he had designed and built the previous year; Greg would be paddling one of his two Guillemot kayaks, the 19-foot expedition version he’d recently completed; and I’d be paddling a fiberglass kayak, the third best looking boat of the three.

When you’re paddling with people in beautiful woodstrip sea kayaks, you soon get used to your own fiberglass kayak getting, well, pretty much overlooked. But that’s okay, I was already dreaming of building my own soon!

We planned to commence our crossing just a few kilometers east of the Confederation Bridge or ‘Fixed Link’ as it’s sometimes called. The bridge, completed in May of 1997 at an estimated cost of one billion dollars, spans 12.9 kilometers of open water and is the longest continuous bridge on Earth. (Our route was actually somewhat longer, and wound up being 16 km.)

After making our preparations, checking the weather forecast and packing our gear for the weekend, we were good to go. We headed out from Moncton, New Brunswick on a warm, sunny Saturday in early September and drove to Cape Tormentine, eagerly anticipating the crossing. We pulled into the parking lot above the long, sandy beach adjacent to the now decommissioned ferry terminal, and carried our sea kayaks and gear down to the water’s edge.

Slipping the kayaks into the water as the tide receded, and securing our neoprene sprayskirts, we could feel the offshore wind on our backs. The weather forecast was good for the weekend: light to moderate offshore winds for the crossing and light winds for the return paddle the following day. Sunny skies and great temperatures! What more could we ask for? Oh yeah, life is good!

The winds gently pushed us towards our destination, one of the almost endless sandy beaches along the Prince Edward Island coast. As we progressed further from the mainland shore, the winds gradually increased and the waves began to grow, becoming both larger and steeper.

Before long we were in 4 to 6 foot waves and catching a little surf here and there, our kayaks being pushed faster by the following seas and strengthening winds. Greg made a comment about his kayak feeling a little weird, that it was not handling the way it normally did. It felt sluggish, he said, as if he’d packed too much weight in the rear compartment, although he was sure he’d packed it pretty much the same as always.

We stayed close together for the rest of the passage, with the shores of the Island becoming more defined as we drew nearer. Off to our left, the giant structure of the Confederation Bridge loomed in the distance. The mainland behind became faint as we pushed on. The seas were rolling and speckled with whitecaps in all directions.

It’s amazing how much fun it is to be out in a slender kayak, paddling along in big waves with a thin greenland paddle as your means of propulsion, just the occasional bracing stroke here and there, the odd rudder stroke with the paddles to maintain course while surfing the following seas. None of our three kayaks was equipped with rudders, all of us preferring to use our paddling skills and enjoy our kayaks the way they were meant to be paddled (although Greg’s Guillemot had a retractable skeg that aided control).

As we neared the Island shores, we pointed our bows towards a little cove with a beautiful sandy beach and negotiated around a few breakers as we hit shallow water. Landing, we eased ourselves out of the kayaks and began pulling gear out of our hatches to haul up above the high tide line, where we would set up camp for the night.

12.9 kilometer Confederation Bridge, the longest continuous bridge on Earth.

This was when Greg discovered the source of his handling problems. Apparently, back on the New Brunswick side as we loaded up the kayaks, Greg’s rear hatch was not properly secured, and during the crossing his boat had taken on a significant amount of water.

The kayak was a beautiful boat that Greg had built over the winter. But in trying to keep a clean look on the deck, he had devised an internal retaining system for his hatches, hidden below deck and controlled from within the cockpit. It looked great and normally worked very well, but today, after loading the kayak, something must have jammed against the hatch retainers and kept them from properly engaging. The result was a flooded rear compartment, an ill-handling sea kayak on an open water crossing and a lot of very wet gear! Other than that, no harm done.

The situation could have been much worse. In big seas, this could have caused a real problem with the rear compartment completely flooding.

We all learned a good lesson that day. Always double-check everything before launching! We got off easy this time but we could have found ourselves having to do a deep water rescue in the middle of the crossing. Fortunately all three of us were well practiced in rescues and all had reliable rolling skills. We also were well equipped with pumps, paddle floats, tow ropes, etc.

Northumberland Strait sunset.

After setting up camp for the night, we passed the evening around a campfire under a star-filled sky with the lights of the Bridge shining all the way across the Strait. A good hot meal and some fine liquid refreshments helped to finish off the evening in style.

The following morning, after a quick breakfast, we broke camp and reloaded the kayaks for the return crossing to the New Brunswick coast. This time we all made doubly sure that our hatches were properly secured, leaving nothing to chance. We’d all learned a lesson and were not eager to make the same mistake again.

Once underway, we aimed for the bridge and paddled near it for most of the return crossing. Sometimes we paddled a couple of hundred meters away, while at other times played ‘giant slalom’ with its gigantic piers. The waters were calm and flat and we took our time, just enjoying being out on the water, finishing off the weekend at a leisurely pace.

It was a great weekend and we all went away with good memories.

© Joe O’Blenis of Nova Scotia has 28 years of paddling experience and is a former competitive cyclist, marathon canoe racer and Past President of the Atlantic Kayak Association. Check out his website: www.geocities.com/outrageous_outdoors/