Menai Straits - 12th June 2011

Second day of coaching from Olly Sanders.

The weather deteriorated quickly on the sunday morning and as forecast the wind got up to strong easterly (F6+) with persistent rain, so we made for the shelter of the Menai Straits to continue practice in the vicinity of the two bridges and the Swellies.

We started off by doing general boat handling under the Menai Bridge, breaking in and out of the flow between the bridge pillars then we progressed down through the swellies to do some more tows.

After lunch we then started the "wet stuff" doing rolls, t rescues, self rescues, scoop rescue of injured/weak paddler, along with watching Mary do an excellent re-entry and roll.

All in all a good weekend, and it was nice to use the tow lines including the deck mounted tow that I have just rigged on to the boat. It illustrated some tuning of my gear is needed - mainly to have a longer "short" tow length set up on my waist tow.

About 4km paddled, not including all the ups and downs in the eddies though!