I visited the Isokari lighthouse island by kayak in 2017 and found it to be a nice place. Well worth a visit again, and this weekend that happened. It proved to be a very memorable trip.
Start from Lokalahti in the early Saturday afternoon. There were four of us.
We expected some waves, but during the first stretch they were fairly modest, well under one meter.
A short break at Rouskeri.
Orpine.
Skim parking.
On the move again.
During this 7 km crossing to Isokari they waves grew, with waves regularly a little over one meter. They were mostly nice and smooth, though.
At Isokari after 1 h 15 min. At this point we left off one member of the gang, to participate in a WWF nature restoration camp at the island.
We continued towards the other side of the island.
The stretch along the southwest part of the island was interesting. Irregular waves resulting from cross waves and reflections with a height of 1.5 m was good training. No pictures of this though, since while the Skim Beaufort behaves very well in waves, the stability pattern doesn't really encourage you to let go of the paddle and take photos in such conditions.
We arrived at our camping spot and I managed to get through the entrance when some big waves came in, giving a feel of big waters. Esko came in on flat water, though. We paddled 23 km this day.
Setting up camp.
There was some amount of wind, and Esko obviously commands the tent to stay in place.
He didn't trust the tent would obey, though.
Dessert.
Esko shakes the vanilla sauce, an Oatly version totally free of milk that was excellent.
Careful composition of a picture for Facebook.
Sunset was at 21:00. The days are getting shorter.
Fullmoon was nice, though...
... and did give a nice light over everything.
The morning.
The lighthouse was still there.
Breakfast.
Purple loose-strife.
Nice stones here and there.
Grey herons flying by.
We started paddling at 8:45.
Checking out a little lagoon.
The north tip of the island.
Now some dark weather started to close in on us. Rain was of course to be expected, but no signs of thunder yet.
When we had made about on third of the crossing back, we heard thunder. At this point the safest option would have been to return to Isokari to wait everything out. We didn't do that, however, and continued. The first thunder front passed a bit south of us and it become lighter for a while. Later another thunder front closed in on us.
For a moment there is started to look like it would get really exciting and I experienced one of my rather rare endorphine rushs. It started to rain hard and the wind rose quickly. The lightning didn't come too close, though, the closest about 1.5 km away and the wind didn't get to storm force, so there was no real problem in practice. No pictures, though, since hard rain on the camera lens would have spoilt coming pictures. The wind affected our speed a lot, though, and by the time we arrived at the closest island everything was over.
Esko is happy not be have been hit by the lightning.
The way home.
This was an interesting little labyrinth, which caused new scratches on the kayak bottom.
The last stretch was quite boring compared to everything else in the trip.
After 22 km we were back where we started. A nice and quite memorable trip. Thanks to the others for the company.
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