Plans sometimes have to change.  Unfortunately, there was blue-green algae in the River Medway.  We had planned to paddle the unaffected section from Yalding to Allington Lock, but when Clare checked the campsite confirmation on the morning of our departure and realised she’d booked for next weekend, our plans were thrown into turmoil.

It was a bank holiday weekend, and everyone was busy, so it was just the two of us, but we still wanted to go out.  We were lucky to find a campsite near Bexhill that wasn’t fully booked.  We headed to Sussex from London, threw up the tents, and went straight to St Leonards On Sea beach.  The sun was going down, lighting up the sky orange and red as we made our way out through the chop.  After paddling for a while, both pointing to the setting sun, we looked at each other with huge grins.  It finally got dark while drinking cider on the beach.

We had been studying the tides and wind and decided to paddle at Pett Level beach on Saturday.  In the morning when we got there it was like a millpond, just over an hour before high tide, a little less so after pumping up the boards.  The water was clear and sea green, we paddled east towards Rye for an hour, stopping for lunch at a cafe.  The swell picked up and was cross-shore after lunch, paddling back was more of a challenge.  We spent this second half on our knees as it was a bit too much for us to stay up for long.  I think I should have tried standing up in the stronger swell as I didn’t fall in – not trying hard enough!?

After a dip in the sea and lying on the beach with an ice cream in the sun, we drove for a paddle on the River Rother, starting at Bodiam Boating Station.  We went east for a couple of hours out and back.

I still had the desire for a sandy beach.  On Sunday, we went to Camber Sands, but there were small breaking waves backed by a light swell – this was only going to get worse.  Along with the 500m walk up a dune and across the crowded beach with our boards it wasn’t ideal, so we decided to go inland to the Royal Military Canal.  Starting from Hamstreet for a couple of hours paddle.  This was actually idyllic, it doesn’t look like a canal and had good views and lots of dragonflies and a heron flying around.

Blog by Stephen I