Last weekend a friend and I planned a last minute camping trip to Cape Romano south or Marco Island, FL. We left from Goodland, a small fishing village on the SE corner of Marco and headed through the backwaters to get out to the Gulf of Mexico. Our destination was Cape Romano, a 10 mile paddle from Goodland. Chris was in his Epic 18 X and was using an Epic Mid Wing paddle.
I was using my Cetus LV with a Greenland stick and kept up the whole time just fine. You could see the 18 was faster on the flat back waters but we evened out completely once we got in the Gulf with some chop. Temperature was a wonderful 72 degrees but a dense Sea Fog was rolling in and we arrived just in time to set up and change clothes for the 15 degree drop in temp.
Cooked up some Hot Italian Sausage for dinner with Shipyard Pumpkinhead Ale on the side. Had a decent sleep in my MSR Hubba and awoke to an even denser fog in the morning. The wind was howling and kicked up a light 2.5-3′ break on the shore. After breakfast the wind died and so did most of the surf. We launched from the beach one at a time. The Epic filled up with water as he tried to get in the boat in the water to avoid any damage to the rudder. I sat on the beach with my skirt on and waited for a wave to pick me up and paddled off, dry inside the boat 🙂 Footpump took care of any water in the cockpit from when putting the skirt on.
Paddled back the 10 miles in a hour and 20 minutes keeping pace with the Epic on flat water this time using an Werner Ikelos and was awarded with White Pelicans, Manatees and numerous Dolphin. All in all a great paddle and always nice to camp from the Cetus LV.
