The challenge

(our description of The Challenge at the start of our expedition)

The planned expedition will cover a total distance of about 3,000 miles clockwise around Britain and Ireland. We aim to paddle around 30 miles a day and we set off from home at Weir Quay on the River Tamar (6 miles upstream of Plymouth) on Saturday 6 April 2013, aiming to complete the circuit and arrive back in Plymouth some 5 months later, taking on the most exposed and notorious stretches of the coast. This includes the 49 mile crossing from south-Wales across the Irish Sea and up the west coast of Ireland open to the full force of the Atlantic Ocean, before crossing over to Scotland and plotting a course up through the breathtakingly beautiful Scottish islands. We will then paddle our way down crossing the Firth of Forth, The Wash and the Thames Estuary on the East coast of Britain before heading West for home! Very few kayakers take on this challenge and fewer still navigate around Ireland as well. This expedition will be the ultimate personal challenge.

The expedition is self-supported and largely self-financed with a key aim being to raise as much money as we possibly can for our two chosen charities. One of these is The Merlin MS Centre - supporting sufferers and their families in Cornwall of the incurable disease, Multiple Sclerosis, many of whom no longer have the privilege of being as active as we are. This is in memory of Jane’s Dad, Derek Lambley who recently died of MS. Our companion charity is The RNLI, who can be relied upon to ‘pick up the pieces’ when people get into difficulty around the British coast.

If you would like to support us in this challenge by donating to one of our chosen charities, please visit our Charities Page.

Specific challenges we will face during the expedition –

• Camping day-in-day-out for up to six months – fine in good weather, but this is Britain and Ireland after all!
• Keeping warm, dry, well fuelled and hydrated; preventing fatigue. Easier said than done on a trip like this, but you’ll only succeed by looking after the basic needs.
• Careful chart plotting for the planning of numerous open water crossings with tidal influences. (PPPPPP – Prior Planning Prevents **** Poor Performance!) Minimizing time spent on the water leaves more R&R time to enjoy the new surroundings.
• Vigilant checking of weather conditions and sea state. It’s not always as forecast and sea conditions can change very rapidly. (As a rule, we don’t paddle at all if we’re not confident that we can paddle in at least one force of wind higher than that which is forecast.)
• Poor weather conditions holding up the trip and lowering morale. More than a couple of days stuck in the middle of nowhere with limited supplies of fresh water and food can quickly become a challenging situation.
• Possessing an acute awareness of strong tidal currents and notorious coastal features such as the fierce tides in the Bristol Channel and around coastal landmarks such as Land’s End, our most westerly point, and Cape Wrath at the tip of Scotland.
• Packing all the essentials into one boat to be self sufficient – prioritising kit. No room for conveniences.

We’ve done a lot of expedition paddling together so have the advantage of knowing each other’s little niggles and quirks and have developed routines which we fall into easily on expedition. When one of us is having a bad day it helps that the other can usually jolly them along and ease the situation.

We relish the self-sufficient nature of the trip both on and off the water; loving the back-to-basics approach of expedition travelling; the wild camping, self-sufficiency and the low environmental impact of this lifestyle. We also love meeting so many interesting people along the way and getting to know the coastal communities we pass through. Secluded little beaches and stream valleys running down to the sea provide perfect locations for a spot of lunch or to camp. These locations are often inaccessible unless approached by water in a small craft like our own. We are extremely excited, having launched from Weir Quay on the River Tamar (6 miles upstream of Plymouth) on Saturday 6 April 2013, to enjoy up to 6 months of this idyllic yet challenging existence.

What we’re looking forward to most –

• Exploring new territory – we’ve paddled a lot in the South and West of England and Wales, however there is an awful lot of coastline we’ve not yet encountered. We particularly relish the notion of paddling around the wild Scottish islands and the scenery and culture of Ireland’s West coast, but it’s the infinite variety offered by our coastline that also entices us.
• Meeting all sorts of people along the way – friends old and new.
• Exhilarating and challenging sea conditions, particularly (but not necessarily just) on the West coast.
• The coastal wildlife we will encounter – seabirds, basking sharks, porpoises, seals …..
• A complete break from normal ‘working week’ routine.
• Arriving at some of the wildest, virtually unexplored and inaccessible parts of the British and Irish coast and islands.
• The simple existence – back to basics with driftwood fires, wild camp spots, wild food (fish).
• The memories to treasure forever.

Progress

To see where we’ve got to on the expedition, you can go to the Progress page and look for the last ‘paddler’ icon (in a clockwise direction from Plymouth). You can hover over the icon to find out more info, such as our visited locations and photos of camp spots etc.

The Gallery page will be updated, as and when we can, with photos from our expedition.

The Contact page gives information about how to get or stay in touch with us in various ways, including via Facebook and Twitter.

About us

Andy and I met through the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award canoeing expedition as teenagers and the rest, as they say, is history! We’re a husband and wife team and have both been paddling various boats for some 20 years and moved to Devon from Berkshire to be closer to the coast about 4 and a half years ago. I have worked as a Cover Supervisor (permanent supply teacher) at Devonport High School for Girls in Plymouth and Andy has worked as a Timber Framer; constructing buildings out of green oak for the Tamar Joinery Company in Bere Alston. In our spare time we both love anything outdoors. We have both rowed regularly with Tamar and Tavy Gig Club and enjoy walking and cycling, messing about on the river – sailing our open canoe or collecting driftwood …….. and flying. (Andy flies a hang glider!)

Some of our previous lengthier sea kayaking expeditions to date include several crossings to the Isles of Scilly (28 miles off Land's End – usually staying at our favourite campsite on St. Agnes), Lundy Island (in the middle of the Bristol Channel), some 250miles exploring the Marlborough Sounds in New Zealand and over 500 miles around the Southwest coast of England and Wales.

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