Our first time ate itself

Well, we did something we've been waiting to do since Christmas when we got our gear and we took pics of our first time out on the water and what happened?  The card f**king ate itself.  Seriously.  We looked at the pics on the way home and when it came time to grab them off the card they were ALL gone.  There was only one snippet of one with me that could be recovered and I was so angry because I'm doing this so that the Mr doesn't die paddleboarding alone.  Why couldn't HIS picture be the one to be saved instead of 3/4 of mine!?!?  In tears.  Just plain in tears because even though we can take pictures in the future, there will never be pictures of that first time.  

Please just give me a second to gather myself and I'll try to tell the story in a way that does not indicate my seething anger, the arrival of my monthly visitor and my utter FML moment that would and could only happen to us.

*ohhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm*

I'm back.

So when the Mr first tried paddleboarding on Kauai in 2010, he was hooked.  When I tried it in 2013, I was not.  However, I did really enjoy kayaking the Hanalei.  From the moment we got back from Kauai that year, the Mr began an obsession to figure out how we could fit a massive paddleboard and massive kayak that goes up to my weight limit (300--most are 225-250) into a shoebox of a one car garage.  The amount of money invested and the amount of space it would take just were not feasible.  

Enter inflatables.

Yep, the Mr came across Tower Paddleboards and read rave reviews for them.  He was lucky enough to score a great deal on one on Black Friday getting a Tower Xplorer 14' Inflatable SUP (affiliate link) which is totally rigid when pumped up and can easily be thrown in the trunk on a whim.  $700 (reg $999)   He basically said if I didn't go with him, he'd start spending weekends at meetups because he was a paddler now.  Ahh, I see...blackmail me with taking away time on the weekend together.  Rat bastard.  :-P  I was kind of thinking kayaking would be a vacation thing but I guess he wanted to go all in.  So in the style of how I snowshoe while he skis in the winter...I bought an Advanced Elements StraitEdge Inflatable Kayak (affiliate link)  he researched that held up to 300 lbs on Black Friday through Amazon for $459 (reg $580) to kayak whilst he paddled.

I encouraged tomfoolery mid-day yesterday and he jumped on it.  We already did a pretty killer arm workout earlier in the day.  That was not smart when I knew in my mind we were doing this later. We strapped on the HRM's to record calories burned and got to pumping up the yak and board.  There were less people around than we saw over the weekend but still enough to make me nervous about getting in.  I spotted another kayaker just kind of hanging out on the grass.  I thought he was done but when a fishing boat got in the water finally, he followed them so I got to watch how he got in from that spot.  My entrance was not graceful but not as bad as it usually was when I practiced on the basement floor.  The Mr gave me a push as I bounced so I could get out into the water.  A smart person would've checked the winds before they left but I'm not smart.  

The kayak was getting lapped a bit by wind whipped waters and the current on the lake was strong because of them.  So my tweaked shoulder from strength a mere 4 hours earlier was yelping from the word go.  We were both pooped just getting everything pumped up, secured and finally getting out into the water.  Then fighting the current was just insane.  I got a longer paddle but somehow it didn't feel wide enough as my paddle would squeak against the side of the yak as I paddled.  I may move one set of my neoprene yak grips down to the bottom to see if it will help with that.  The Mr looked tired, happy, nervous and just plain unsure for the first half of our journey.  I worried that he was thinking he'd made a mistake and was afraid to tell me after the months of talk and more money invested than I care to recall.

We got into a groove and went under a bridge and down to where it opened up into a bend.  At that point we'd been paddling for an hour and my shoulder was feeling like I was going to injure it if I kept going against the wind.  The Mr agreed it was time to head back.  He took this pic of me, it's the only one that didn't eat itself.

I guess I'm glad we got something but the whole point is this is his thing so I'm so upset that he has no pics of himself on his board for the first time.  We paddled back to the dock and don't you know, some bicycler decided to ride into the parking lot and stand around to watch the fat people disembark.  I wanted to punch him as I glared at him from a distance behind my floating sunglasses .  (affiliate link) (Hey, I'm not losing my sunglasses at the bottom of a lake!)  The Mr paddled in and dragged his board onto the grass.  Then I power paddled to try to propel myself as far as I could onto the shore.  I got about 1/4 of the yak onto the shore so I just scooted up and exited with the Mr's assistance without incident.    He left with a somewhat disappointed look on his mug.  Sorry biker boy, no fat shaming on YouTube from you!  HA!

We deflated the floaties and jammed 'em in the trunk and the Mr blew them back up at home and dried them properly.  I burned 1125 calories and the Mr burned 1995.  (He used the harder pump, my pump inflates when pumping up and down so it inflated in half the time.)  When we got home, I made dinner (a recipe for the other channel that'll be live in a month but in the mean time, check out this week's recipe!)  We could feel the energy being absorbed from the food...that's when you know you've worked hard!

I want to take the kayak out a time or two again before I do an official review on it despite taking pics of it folded, deflated and pumped ahead of time.  Curse you memory card gods.  I'm going to bake that card in the oven for revenge.

But despite fighting the current, my shoulder hurting, people staring and all that jazz, I still had a good time because I was with my honey and that's what life is all about Charlie Brown.

This post is dedicated to S.B. ...a fellow yaker recovering from a successful stint in the OR yesterday.  I did my first go out on the water in honor of you once we had word you were okay.  We can't wait to get out on the water with you guys when you're recovered!

Do you do water sports?  Would you ever get inflatables to take up paddleboarding or kayaking?

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