Yesterday, Jan, Gerard, Brechtus, Fred and I paddled around the Island of Texel in one day.
This 35 nautical mile route is generally done as an overnight trip, but it is Jan's favorite day trip, that he now annually puts on the Peddelpraat calendar for 'long-distance' paddlers. The weather was perfect! Sunny, not too much but cooling headwind on the first half, increasing wind and waves in the afternoon to surf us back to Den Helder.
And we finally found the VC Cardinal marker (again). It is one of those elusive 'watermarks' that we discussed that it might even be a 'ghostly' encounter once in ones sea kayaking career. Fred had never heard of "The VC" before, but this was his first paddle around Texel ever so he is excused and he could count himself very lucky indeed. We could write a series of stories about it titled: "My VC". I have only seen it once before and it is also Jan's second encounter.
The reason why sea kayakers seldom get to see the VC is not so dramatic as we generally take a shortcut over the tidal flats that most of the times we get to heavily regret as it then turns out to be paddling for miles in very shallow water; a real drag.
Helped by GPS and a strongly suppressed urge to take the shortcut got us to the VC 'spot-on' with mostly deep water to cruise us along. Arriving back at Den Helder another 'elusive' and rare experience awaited us. What it is? You will have to join next time and be lucky...
Back home, crashing on my bed, I turn on the TV and drop into a "Pirates of the Caribbean", Romanticizing about the VC as a gold-laden "Black Pearl".
P.S. 4 out of 5 paddled with a GPS and I hope to put the other tracks also on-line soon, as it probably shows an interesting insight into this Peddelpraat trip :-)
