The Ormes - 9th June 2013

With a decent forecast (sunny, F2-3 variable winds), I was keen to get out on the sea rather than a canal session, so I joined up with Jules, Gary and Dave from the NWSK on their trip around the Ormes.

We set off around 10:20am from the West Shore Llandudno and headed off to round the Great Orme. The tide was flooding, giving us a bit of assistance, but this was due to change to a westerly flow around noon.

As we made our way round the first headland, the wind increased and small waves coming from the NE were reflecting off the foot of the cliffs to give some choppy conditions, nothing too scary, but not what you would expect given the forecast.

The cliff ledges were packed with birds - mainly Razorbills and Guillemots, along with small colonies of gulls and Cormorants. Occasionally some of the birds would leave their nests and dive down seawards to pick up air speed before skimming the surface and heading out to sea.

Looking back towards the Great Orme

We stopped briefly for a tea/coffee break on a small pebble beach, just before Pen-trwyn and the final headland before Llandudno pier.

We set off across the east bay of Llandudno towards the Little Orme. Dave decided he didn't want to put too much strain on his wrist that had been bothering him, so he opted to have a snooze on the beach to wait for our return.

En route to Little Orme

Continuing around the Little Orme, we again encountered choppy conditions. Once round Jules landed for a comfort stop on a stony beach that had small surf landing on it. I wasn't that desperate for either a pee, or to damage my boat, and neither was Gary, so we stayed in our boats and waited for Jules. (Jules has the advantage of an electric pump in his boat, so he can get in his boat in deeper water in the small surf and it doesn't matter if waves swamp the boat, because the pump can deal with it - this protects his boat from damage on the stony beach.)

We paddled back to meet Dave on Llandudno east beach and had a relaxing lunch and brew.

After the lazy lunch we retraced our route back around Great Orme and returned to the West Shore and the long carry up the beach.

About 23km paddled, off the water at 4:30pm.