I realize I have not posted in awhile. In an effort to post more, I may not confine myself to camp stories. Although, I have already failed to do that.
From 2002-2006, I was stationed in Okinawa. Prior to going there, my entire entire body of knowledge had been gleaned from watching the Karate Kid. A lot of wonderful things happened in Okinawa, not the least, meeting my wife. We went on a number of adventures together. After work, we would often meet up to do a bit of evening kayaking.
The kayak I had was designed by a company called Folbot. I had never tried a foldable kayak before, but I bought it because it could be shipped via the USPS to Okinawa for a reasonable price. I had a blast with that sucker, it was not the sleekest or the fastest craft, but it was well built, sturdy and lots of fun. Most of the time, we paddled along the shoreline of Okinawa in a body of water called the South China Sea. On most days it was relatively calm, and even if there were swells, you would gently ride up and over them.
Our usual launch location was a Marina located near the Air Force Base. This marina was leased by the US Government and used primarily by Americans. There was a good core group of older guys who would gather most evenings, stand near a boat and drink a lot of beer together. These guys were all boat owners and they would rotate which boat they drank near. They made no pretext about it, they didn't even climb aboard a boat and act like they were working on it. They were there to drink beer, near boats. In some ways that reflects my drinking experiences in college where I would drink beer, near girls.
Even if it was a little choppy, it was always calm in the harbor because it was surrounded by breakwalls. It was always a little dicey leaving the harbor because it was quite shallow and if the swells were a bit larger than usual, they would break over the mouth of the harbor. But, provided that you could keep your kayak headed straight in to the waves, it was no problem. Our usual route would be to paddle straight out for a bit and then turn to paddle along the shoreline.
On this particular evening, it was a bit windier than usual, but did not cause any real alarm. We were also running a bit late, we didn't have any lights on the kayak so we tried to make sure we were in before dark. It started out as a routine paddle. We paddled the 400 yards or so to the mouth of the harbor, and as expected the waves were breaking. Breaking a bit harder than usual. As we continued paddling, I realized that if we turned go along the shoreline, we would take the waves broadside and it would not be very comfortable paddling. I also felt like we were not making particularly good time, so we would paddle out a bit and then turn back for a quick paddle in. We probably paddled for about 25-30 minutes.
When I turned around to see how far we were from shore, it was immediately apparent that something was wrong. We were much further off shore than we should have been. Also, as soon as we turned around we felt the wind blowing quite strongly in our faces. The reason it had felt so slow on the way out was that we were being pushed by the wind so we didn't feel the usual breeze you feel just from moving through the air. I didn't want to panic my wife, so I kept quiet but was paddling much harder than I normally would. The problem was, when you are off shore it is not immediately apparent if you are making any progress. It was quickly getting dark too. We were getting wet from the spray off each successive wave. Unlike the way out, where we were surfing along the waves, we were now crashing through them.
Eventually, I had to tell my wife. I let her know that I was concerned that we were not making any forward progress and the wind had blown us much further out than I expected. She doubled down with her paddling, and after about 5-10 minutes, scary minutes, it became clear that we were making forward progress. Still, no-one talked until we were safely in the harbor. As we took the boat out, the old men drinking team let us know they were concerned we had gone out. Not concerned enough to put down their beers though.
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