Wikle is expecting 40 participants for the rough-water weekend, and when they join the nearly 20 coaches in the lodge’s dining room for lunch, the scene resembles a crowded school cafeteria. Or a class of ’83 reunion— the demographic at Gales is typical for sea kayaking; clearly adrenaline- charged surfs aren’t just a young person’s game. With the wind still gusting to well over 30 knots, the river mouth re-
mains a no-paddle zone. Most head upriver for workshops on paddling in current, maneuvering in wind and waves, and practicing advanced rescues, while a handful of keeners convoy to nearby Sandy Beach for a surfing lesson. With its long, shallow approach, Sandy is a “spilling” beach—the waves break gradually, dispersing their energy as they roll ashore—mak- ing it a more forgiving training ground. Even so, with the intense onshore wind, students and coaches alike are soon exhausted. It takes every last ounce of effort to merely hold position in the shore wash, let alone punch out through the breakers. Spinning a 16- or 17-foot craft 180 degrees to surf back in is all but impossible. Eventually, a couple of participants abandon their boats on the sand in
favor of body surfing. Like a massive heat sink, Lake Superior maintains its summer temperature well into the fall, making the famously cold lake feel comparably balmy on bracing autumn days. In drysuits, we discover, being in the water is more comfortable than being on it. Before long, the whole class is belly flopping into the surf, our unflappable coaches leading the charge. Like the animated scene in the dining room earlier, the impromptu
body surfing session demonstrates that Gales is as much a social venue as it is a place to hone rough-water skills. By day two the wind has abated to a manageable 10–15 knots and
the coaches are able to move their classes out into the bay. While I’m watching Franklin speed launch, Wells wanders over. Gazing across the frozen beach at the colorful clusters of shivering figures and rime-crusted boats, he marvels, “Look how many people are on the water in sub-zero temperatures—it’s frickin’ awesome!” Tracing a coastline of long, gravel beaches and billion-year-old bed-
rock points, Franklin leads our group through a progression of landing and launching exercises. Then it’s the students’ turn. Franklin asks Su- san—the Ann Arbor, Michigan, paddler whose mistake, it turned out, was clicking ‘Register Now’ on the Gales website before she had all the facts—and two others, Tom and Sue, to direct an “emergency” group landing on an inhospitable, rocky spit exposed to the swell. So far we’ve excelled as students, but it quickly becomes apparent that our
leadership needs some work. A confident and capable paddler from Min- neapolis, Sue doesn’t think there’s a safely manageable landing for a group on the point. Tom, a local in his mid-forties, disagrees but doesn’t want to be the first to land—inexplicably, he suggests Sue lead the assault. Meanwhile, Susan says little—later she’ll tell us she felt excluded by her co-leaders.
72 ADVENTURE KAYAK | SPRING 2013
We bob around in the unsettled waters for what feels like an eternity,
our designated leaders mired in indecision. Finally, Franklin tosses them a lifeline, “You could ask your group to help, and send one of your strongest students in first to land the others… you can send me if you like.” Franklin sidles up to the rocks and steps nimbly onto a sliver of ledge,
timing her exit with the surging rise and sucking fall of the waves against the smooth-polished stone. Sue lands next and suddenly our leaders are working together—if not a well-oiled machine, at least one that is no longer seized. By evening, snowflakes are filling the air. We carpool into Wawa for
dinner, heaters blasting as we bounce up the potholed track away from the lake. Dashing across the parking lot beneath the wall-eyed gaze of the Wawa Motor Inn’s 15-foot rooftop goose, we escape the flurries in the restaurant’s warm, woodsy sanctuary. Over a basket of the Motor’s famous wings (chicken, not goose), Jeff,
one of the coaching week students, fills me in on his assessment. “I worked really, really hard to learn I can stay [at the certification level] where I’m at,” he confesses. Jeff and his wife Michelle drove from Minneapolis to be at Gales, but he isn’t angry or even disappointed with this outcome. “Sam and Ryan didn’t just say ‘nope, you’re not good enough,’” Jeff says of his coaches. “They gave me honest, useful, realistic feedback so I came away with a list of areas for improvement—somewhere to go from here.”
Sunday morning, sudden squalls alternate with sunshine and whitecaps are building beneath the schizophrenic sky. Superior has kept the coaches on their toes all weekend. Every day begins with an instructors’ plan- ning meeting—a dozen of the international sea kayaking community’s brightest luminaries gathered around a battered wooden table and blaz- ing woodstove in the lodge’s steamy kitchen. As you might expect, there’s plenty of discussion: stay and play at the river mouth? Carpool to a near- by beach? Or try to paddle to the beach? Eavesdropping on the coaches’ discussion, I can see that this group—
even with their tremendous cumulative skills and experience—is grap- pling with the same challenges as yesterday’s student leaders. The same challenges faced by all kayakers: complex environments and decisions, fatigue and uncertainty. Wikle tells me later that, even more than the curveballs thrown by the
weather, the skill level of the participants has surprised his guest coaches. “I’m told it’s quite high compared to other parts of the country,” he says, “it seems Great Lakes kayakers take developing skills and seamanship more seriously than many of their counterparts on the West Coast.” Later that afternoon, the current flooding out of the river mouth push- es against the incoming swell, forming steep glassy rollers. The conditions
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