In my years on the lake, I’d lost count of
how many times I had watched the search and rescue Hercules circling the steely skies above foam-streaked waters. I had witnessed forensic divers searching for the body of an experienced solo paddler who’s final decision—to go rather than to stay— had proved deadly. But when I inventoried the dozens of
emotions I experienced every day, fear was seldom amongst them. Most of the time, I felt calm, at ease. An expedition, I have always believed, is open to anyone who dares to depart with hatches and imagina- tion full. Even if your boat—like my own 16 feet of rotomolded yellow plastic—is more weekend warrior than devoted trip- per. Even if so are you. I wasn’t afraid of the dark. I didn’t lie
awake fretting over the night noises beyond the walls of my silnylon sanctuary. Even the unpredictable moods of the great, restless waters didn’t scare me. But I scared myself a few times. In six-foot waves on a remote five-mile crossing. In a clumsy slip beside a two-story drop to unyielding bedrock. In the reflection of a mirror in a campground washroom after 43 days on the water. My gut twisted and my skin prickled the
evening a man appeared from the bushes near my tent. My hands were so numb on the aforementioned crossing I wondered if the paddle would slip from my grasp. Falling to my knees on the far shore, I thanked the ev- ergreen hills, the copper cliffs and the howling wind for sparing my foolish self. It’s healthy to experience fear in these
situations, as long as you can rein it in and keep enough wits to make your way back to safer circumstances. Our fight-or-flight response—unchanged through millennia of evolution—is what has kept us alive in the face of saber-toothed tigers, thunderstorms and Simon Cowell. It is irrational fear that is problematic.
The clamoring, claustrophobic fear that doesn’t bow to fight or flight. Fear of the dark beyond your vestibule. Fear of being alone. Fear of growing old, or sick, or even just less willful. Fear of being afraid. Fear is a strange bedfellow. Like a good
story, a carefully crafted paranoia is rarely hampered by the truth. I have friends from the country who are terrified of the city. And urban friends who fear if they venture too far beyond city limits, they are sure to meet a slow painful end, if not from wolves or exposure than from an equally silent killer, boredom. This fear of nothing to do is a surpris-
ingly prevalent one. Or perhaps it is not so surprising. After all, we live in the most hyper-stimulated, over-programmed place and time the world has ever known. Here’s a typical conversation, this one with a curious passer-by I met outside a campground office: “You’re out here alone?” asks curious.
32 PADDLING MAGAZINE
“Yes,” I reply. “By yourself?” curious confirms. “Uh-huh.” “What do you do all day?” A refreshing
break from the “Aren’t you scared?” line of questioning. “Well, I paddle until late afternoon, then I make camp, cook dinner, explore the beach, jot down my thoughts…” “Sure, sure, but after all that—don’t you,
y’know, get kinda… bored?” “Nah, I like having time to just sit and think and quietly observe nature,” I say. Open-mouth stare. “Besides, I’m quite tired by the end of the
day,” I continue awkwardly, “I go to sleep pretty early.” “Oh yeah, of course,” curious nods. It’s
the first thing I’ve said that makes any sense. The ability to quickly summon un- consciousness is evidently the only thing that’s kept me alive in the absence of smartphones, Twitter feeds and Duck Dy- nasty downloads. As Annie Getchell, a fellow solo sea kay-
aker, writes in Going Alone of trying to describe her experience to friends post-trip, “How do I explain about returning to stimu- lation instead of being?” Perhaps solo kayak expeditions would
enjoy broader appeal if more people learned to differentiate between irrational fear and actual risk. If you need evidence our sensors are screwy, look no further than the millions of dollars spent every year pre- paring for a zombie apocalypse. How is it acceptable to worry about the undead, but I am crazy to paddle by myself? The dawn of the dead notwithstand-
ing, most of us face relatively few mortal threats in our day-to-day lives. Immersing yourself in a wild environment, develop- ing the mindfulness to safely negotiate its hazards, finding the awareness that comes without constant artificial stimulation, acknowledging your apprehensions and calmly setting them aside—all of this is immensely and uncommonly rewarding. In the words of another solo woman ad-
venturer and writer, Jill Frayne, “To be in undisturbed places is good for humans and, at least once, you have to go alone. Nature brings us to ourselves.” On the subject of fear, Frayne continues,
“Sometimes camping alone puts an ache in my throat, a feeling close to homesickness. But I don’t think fear explains it. I think the feeling has to do with nature herself, the force of her presence. Nature gets us down to size, disquiets us, makes us anxious and lonesome and thrilled.” Am I scared? The only thing I truly fear
as a kayaker is the day that no one pad- dles alone because it’s too dangerous—or worse, too boring. Editor Virginia Marshall does have an-
other fear: tripping without chocolate. But she insists it is completely rational.
This article first appeared in the Spring 2014 issue of Adventure Kayak.
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