ron-t kayaking blog
14 June 2017 .............. Penrhyn Mawr
Another odd day weatherwise - sitting over nearly all of Wales was a high pressure - but a bit out to the west there was a low pressure, and a bit of a front was coming up from the southwest, right up the west coast of Wales - just catching the western tip of Pembrokeshire, the western tip of the Lleyn Peninsula, and north west Anglesey.
So out in the Irish sea there was fair bit of wind, over most of Wales there was little wind.
It was a bit of gamble as to how the weather would turn out - both the Met Office and XCWeather reckoned that the west coast would start the day with little wind, but it would increase by late afternoon, and then there would be more days of windy weather.
Well they just about got it right, and we had a super day with little wind until later on in the afternoon.
So what to do with the day - it was a flood tide through the middle of the day until about mid afternoon - what about a play at Penrhyn Mawr.
Well it seemed as if every other sea kayaker in North Wales had the same idea - Porth Dafarch was mobbed, and by mid morning every space for parking was gone.
Out at Penrhyn Mawr now, and I was surprised how high the tide was, I didn`t think it would have been so high already.
The middle race was very chunky and a bit of a no-no for wimps like me, but there was plenty of moving water to play in around the inner races, so it was all good fun.
One of the Search and Rescue helicopters came along to see what was happening - I think they were doing some kind of an excercise, as there was an orange smoke flare set off at one point on hillside above the cliffs.
Every now and then it would fly around over Penrhyn Mawr to see what we were all up to -
Eventualy the current started to slow a bit, and it was well past my lunch time, so I headed in to the beach at the back of Penrhyn Mawr that you can only get to at high tide, and had lunch sitting in the sun.
Lunch time past, and some other groups had arrived back from further up the coast, and the middle race had toned down a bit, so it provided some good sport for a while.
However a bit too soon even that died down, so it was time to head away, and I wandered further up the coast, round the next sort of headland and into the bay, and in towards the hidden passage.
I found some excellent examples of the sort of amazing rock deformations that happened so many millions of years ago - a good example of the sort of rock bending that went on -
I also found a more unusual view of the folded rocks - two sort of ridges where the rocks had been folded - there several examples around the area where you see the folded rocks end on like in the above picture, but there are much fewer examples where you actually see along the fold.
The hidden passage was in good form, it is the first time for a long time that I have been able to paddle through the whole length of it, including the narrow bits at both ends - looking through it from the south end -
Safely through the narrows right along at the far end, and looking back into the narrows at the north end of the hidden passage -
I headed out across Abraham`s Bosom towards South Stack, but didn`t go the whole way across - here it is, the classic view of South Stack.
The now ebb tide gave me an easy run back to Penrhyn Mawr - however before I got there I deviated off to the left and went caving - there is a big big cave just before the south end of Abraham`s Bosom, and it was looking rather inviting.
There was a bit of swell inside the cave, but I got a long way in -
With the ebb tide it was by now of course a much quieter sea around Penrhyn Mawr - approaching Tide Rip Rock, the outermost rocky island of Penrhyn Mawr.
Past Penrhyn Mawr now, and looking across to Dinas Stack - the most obvious cave isn`t actually much of a cave, but a bit to its left the less obvious opening is the arch.
A closer view of the arch, with the sea inside it looking rather calm.
In reality, the sea was anything but calm - that arch has an amazing ability to magnify any kind of swell coming in, as it gets both narrower and shallower at the far side of the arch.
I got through it okay, making a better job of it than last time - timing is everything.
Round behind Dinas Stack there is another cave - again, it is a big one -
The cave wasn`t suffering from the same amount of swell that the arch was getting, so I got a long way in - it is another big big cave.
I went to see if I could get a picture of the rear of the arch, but there isn`t really anyway to do it - however I sat and watched in amazement as wave after wave came crashing through the arch - usually with swell you get maybe three or maybe five big ones, then you get a quieter period with smaller swell, then the big ones start up again.
However the big ones never stopped - I lost count of how many there were, and it was quite a strange sensation watching them, and knowing that I had just paddled through it.
Then suddenly they stopped - it went quiet - and I blasted back through the arch again and out the far side before the big ones started up again.
Success !
Away back round Dinas Stack now and most of the way back to Porth Dafarch - just before you go into the confines of Porth Dafarch there is a sort of high rocky headland, and just behind it there is a deep recess - I have seen it many times both from my boat and from the path along the cliff tops, and I have never before realised that it is actually a very deep cave.
It goes a long way in - so another big big cave.
And so back to Porth Dafarch, after an excellent day out, just as the wind was starting to increase.
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