West Bay to Portsmouth

West Bay to Portsmouth Saturday 6 June to Sunday 8 June

West Bay slip

Gary aka Action man with a friend Mick Rogers decided to walk from West Bay to Chapman's Pool a distance of 55 miles in one hit. Most sane people who decided to do the walk did it over three days. Now what has this got to do with me and my kayak training..?

You guessed it I said I would paddle the distance and some to Portsmouth by the Sunday where I was going to meet Gary again who had completed the round the harbours cycle race.


The alarm went off at 0500 hours on Friday 6th June and I crawled out of my pit to get the last few things organised before setting off for West Bay. Gary, Pete my dad and I set off for West Bay as I had planned to be on the water by 0730 hours but it turned out to be 0810 hours.

I left the security of the harbour walls of West Bay and headed east towards Portland Bill. The sea was choppy but I had the wind and tide with me which was fun to start off with.





West Bay Harbour

I got into a rhythm and was settling in nicely but I was not going to make Portland Bill by slack water! This proved to be problematic as we were nearly on spring tides and I did not fancy battling against the tides and also the updated weather report given by Portland Coastguard was also not favourable. They predicted strong wind warnings which would of blown against the tide which would of meant the sea would of become a wee bit choppy! In light of this I decided to turn back to the safety of West Bay. The western side of Portland has a rocky shore and chesil beach is a steep pebble beach which has boat crunching waves breaking onto it. I did not fancy trying to attempt to get to Portland Bill only to find the conditions were worsening and then there was nowhere to land safely. I thought I would come back to fight again another day and retreat with my tail between my legs. This was the right idea but paddling back to West Bay took 2 hours an hour longer than it took me to get to the turn around point. I made the shelter of West Bay, kicked back and waited for my dad to come back and collect me which he did which was very kind of him.


So Gary had set off and I was back in Wareham after only doing 12.3 nautical miles in 3hrs 17 mins.






Saturday 7 June


I then decided I would set off from Wareham and paddle to Hurst Castle opposite the Needles where I would camp the night and then paddle onto Portsmouth on the Sunday. I set off as the tide was out at Wareham Quay and I knew the tide was turning in my favour for 0900 hrs approximately. I got out of the harbour and kayaked across Bournemouth Bay about 1 mile from the shore. The sun was shining and and there was no wind which was nice but by the time i had reached Hengisbury Head there was a W S/W. I arrived at H/Head and decided to have a 15min leg stretch and a bite to eat.




Heading east

Dodgy looking bloke!

Hengisury Head

This turned out to be really annoying as all the kayak wanted to do was turn into the wind and send me on a course for the needles. This wind was combined with the tidal flow which was sending 2-3' sets of waves heading NE. I decided I would move closer to the shore to see if this made any difference which it did a bit.

Hurst Castle

I soon arrived at Hurst Castle and got my pitch ready for the night. I dug a little shell scrape on the beach behind a groyne and settled in for the night. I loved it with the sound of the waves lapping on the shore. I was pleased I paddled to Hurst Castle as it has been one of my kayaking
objectives for a long time. The views were stunning. It made me appreciate how lucky I am to do these type of things. It also made me focus on the challenge in hand at the end of the month and why I am raising money for Rainbow Trust.

Hurst Castle looking east up the Solent.

My Groyne and a room with a view!