Some spells of nice settled weather enabled me to get on the water twice this month.
First trip was on Sat. Jan. 4th. when I took my Neris Smart 1 kayak to the Negratin reservoir. I don't often use the Smart One on the reservoir but on this occasion I wanted to visit the 'badlands' side, on the opposite shore to where I launch at Playa de Freila. I hadn't been to that side of the reservoir for a long time and the Smart One is a much better kayak for a lengthy open-water crossing. If an unexpected wind comes whistling up the reservoir the water can get quite rough, as I've found out a couple of times. Got on the water soon after 11:00 am and was back on shore 3½ hours later, after paddling 11.5 kilometres. Not surprisingly for January it was quite a cool morning, but there weren't any unexpected winds. It was a good start to my paddling year.
Second trip was on Sat. Jan. 25th. at Mojacar, with my packraft. Hadn't paddled this bit of the coast since I parted with my little Gumotex Twist kayak. Getting much larger (and heavier) kayaks to the water, across a wide expanse of soft sand, was off-putting. But it was dead easy with the packraft – carry everything across the sand in a largish hold-all, inflate the packraft at the edge of the water – and go. I'm really warming to the simplicity and capabilities of packrafts. Was on the water for 1¾ hrs. and paddled 5.0 kilometres of quite choppy water.
