Pancake Creek 2014 - Trip Report

Nev, Phil, Jono and myself found ourselves free for a paddle in the week post Easter so we took off for Pancake Creek for four days of paddling.  We spent the four days exploring this stretch of coast so ended up with 90 kms of paddling and 10 kms of walking (for some of us).

Its a 28-29 km paddle into Pancake Creek from Turkey Beach which seemed to be the best option given half the trip would be down wind and half the trip would be with a head wind and we could use tides to assist.  Paddling from 1770 is around the same distance but wouldn't have been as interesting paddle given the rock gardening opportunities around Rodds Peninsular.

Day 1 - The plan was to use an outgoing tide to cruise out of Rodds Bay and then up to the top of Rodds Peninsular where we would catch the incoming tide down to Pancake Creek.

We checked the charts and the tides and we were on the water just after day break and without much effort were paddling over 9 kms an hour out of the bay thanks to the tidal assistance - this was the last hour of the outgoing tide. We got our first introduction to the midges which chased us out of the bay - they disappeared as the wind picked up.  Note you need to be prepared for the midges and mosquitoes when camping in this area.

Our timing seemed to be good and even though we had a slight headwind as we crested the top of Rodds Peninsular, we thought the incoming tide would offset this.  We had a break just after Flora Point to await the change of tide - a great spot for Oysters and for a walk if you enjoy interesting geology.  There is a fresh water creek tucked into the back of the ocean side of this beach.

I stuffed the tide movement around this headland as the ocean side of Rodds Peninsular faces North so you are paddling East as you come down the coast (meaning an incoming tide is against you...oops!).  We had some tired paddlers setting up camp at Pancake Creek that afternoon.

We camped at the first official campsite which meant we avoided the boaties campsite and picked up more wind from the South-Easterlies which helped a bit with the midges and mosquitoes.  Not enough for my liking and a winter visit may be in order next time.

There are a number of potential campsites along Rodds Peninsular.  They are more exposed and have a long flat beach at low tide, but you could have surf at your doorstep, fresh water close by, rock gardens and no boaties polluting your campsite with their crap.

Day 2 - Started early for me with a morning walk up Clews Point to the light station and on for views over Aircraft Beach and Bustard Head.  By the time I had returned our two elder statesmen had decided that a non-paddling day was in order.

Jono and myself decided to paddle down to try and find the entrance to Chinamans creek, which links Pancake Creek to Jenny Lind Creek. We ended up missing the small creek (I do mean small as it was less than a meter wide at the entrance) as we decided it was too small so we paddled to the end of current creek into crocodile country (yes there have been sightings of crocodiles) until we ran out of creek where I ploughed through some mud and went for a walk on a salt plain to see if there were any obvious  links to Jenny Lind Creek.

We decided we had enough playing in the mangroves and headed out to the Pancake Creek Bar for a surf.  The bar takes off from Pancake Point and runs parallel to Clews Point.  It makes a natural sand point spit that works in a south easterly swell.  The sand spit runs for a few hundred meters allowing for perfect sea kayaking waves.  We had avoided spring and neap tides so we had breaking waves continually for the few days we were there.

Once we exhausted ourselves on the bar, we paddled up to the top of Clews Point where the swell had been pushed up in the afternoon and was breaking on the rock platform outside the headland, and then pushing through the top bay which breaks across a sand bottom.  Very similar to Tea Tree Bay at Noosa.

Day 3 - Today we had a loose plan to paddle around Clews Point, then Aircraft Beach, then Bustard Head and if possible, into Jenny Lind Creek if we went that far.

We convinced the whole pod to join us and that they could select out at any point along the way.  It was a great paddle up to Bustard Head and where two of the pod turned around at Inner Rocks heading back with the wind to chill at the campsite.  Jono and myself paddled around Bustard head in the rebound coming off the cliffs until we saw our way to where the entrance of Jenny Lind Creek should be. There was heavy surf crashing onto the beach so it wasn't obvious as to where the creek entrance was so we sat off shore for a while before retracing our steps back to Clews Point.

At Clews Point we played in the surf until we needed a break on the beach in the first cove.  The waves were small and perfectly shaped and we fine tuned our surfing in this gentle surf pushed in by a meter of SErly swell.

Jono and I had a late afternoon walk up to Bustard Head where the caretakers took us on a tour of the lighthouse to watch the sun go down.  We took our lights for an evening hike back to camp (around 8 km round trip).

Day 4 - We had a leisurely pack and took off around 9:00 am.  We had a slight diversion of a quick surf on the Pancake Creek bar before catching runners generated by 10-15 knots of SErly breeze on the way to the top of Rodds peninsular where we stopped for a lunch break and waited for the tide to turn.

We were at the top of the peninsular far too quickly as we knew we would need to turn into the headwind and slog across Rodds Bay on the way back to Turkey Beach.  It is a six hour drive back to Brisbane so we made the choice to paddle back early in the tide cycle rather than wait for the full support of the 2-3 knots run in tide.  By the time we had packed up, we were off around 3:30 pm and back in Brisbane around 9:30 pm.

I couldn't miss out the following shot of Phil holding station.  He did get up 5 hours before take off so he could get on the water first and practice this...

So to Jono, Nev and Phil; thanks for the laughs and joining me on exploration of Pancake Creek and surrounds.

First Trip in the Pace 17 Tour

In upgrading from the Nordkapp to a new expedition boat, there were a number of boxes that the new sea kayak would need to tick:
1. It would need a rudder, but with the ability to respond and turn well to edging.
2. It would need to have the capacity to carry more gear.
3. It would need to still paddle well under a full expedition load.
4. It would need to have a faster hull speed than the Nordkapp.
5. It would need to surf well and not bury the nose.
6. It would need to be stable in all conditions and not sacrifice stability for speed.
7. It would need to be lighter than the Nordkapp and strong enough to withstand the rigours of expedition paddling.

After a week of paddling this boat in all conditions I must say that I'm a happy paddler.  I wasn't shy about throwing some gear at the boat and had it fully loaded.  With either current assist or following sea, it wasn't difficult to get it sitting on 9-10 kms per hour.

When down wind paddling, I was able to link waves together and paddle over the top of waves to break into the set in front without digging into my reserves to do so.  It ran true and straight and never buried its bow so to loose momentum.

Surfing was a treat with the boat responding well to edging and a stern rudder.  Given it ran well on the waves, I was able to get some 200+ meter rides when surfing the Pancake Creek Bar.

I did some tentative rock gardening without leaving any gel coat behind.  It had great stability and was comfortable sitting in the wash off Bustard Head with 10-15 knots of SE wind pushing the swell up leaving us bouncing around.

Rolling the boat is very easy and you feel well attached to the boat given the thigh braces.

I haven't had a boat with a small hatch forward of the cockpit before but found it very helpful.  Managed to fill that up as well!  I was still able to access the day hatch on the ocean, though I tend to avoid using the day hatch where possible.

The only water ingress I had was into the rear hatch.  I'm not sure if that was through the hatch cover seal or via the rudder cable.  This only happened once on the trip so I am assuming some sand under the hatch cover may be responsible.

The standard rudder worked well but I will revisit this once I install a sail.  The only other modification I will make will be to install a pump and I will consider replacing the existing seat with my "bumfortable" seat as the back-band was not comfortable.  The current seat doesn't have channels to allow water to flow to a pump set up behind the seat so I will either have to make some channels or consider some other option.

Looking forward to my next paddle!

Pancake Creek; the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Pancake Creek, situated in the Eurimbula National Park is a picturesque paddling destination which has something for every paddler. You can take off from either the Town of 1770 or from Turkey Beach via Rodds Peninsular.  The distance is similar from either start point - around 28 kms.

I'd recommend starting from Turkey Beach rather than the Town of 1770 to save yourself a potential 28 km slog into our SE trade winds with 20 kms of open beach which catches the swell around the end of the Great Barrier Reef.

The Good
Rodds Peninsular offered some excellent Rock Gardening opportunities along with Clews Point and Bustard Head.  The entrance into Pancake Creek is through deep water with no breaking waves.

We had two excellent surfing locations within 200 meters of the campsite.  There is a sand spit on the other side of Pancake Creek which had a breaking wave along its 400+meter length, offering 200+ meter rides.  As our trip coincided with the lower half of the tide cycle, we had breaking waves for the duration of our stay. The other break is very similar to Tea Tree at Noosa with a reef break on the outside of the point which works when there is larger swell around and a natural sand point break on the inside (as per the photo below - note camping would be on the headland itself rather than behind the beach).

We camped at the 3rd bay down from Clews Point.  This allowed us to rock hop around to the main campsite and to hike across to Aircraft Beach and the Bustard Head lighthouse (and on to the Jenny Lind Creek Lookout).

Pancake Creek is a well known fishing spot, containing an inshore reef, rocky outcrops, a natural harbour, yabbies, oysters and good fishing.  There is a constant stream of sea turtles, dolphins, reef sharks, rays and other wildlife visible from your campsite.

The Bad
MIDGES and MOSQUITOES.  Come well prepared and you can minimise your interactions with these ubiquitous monsters.  Our trip was in Autumn but the days were still hot so we were covering  up with deet, long sleeves, long pants and head wear whenever we were on shore.  We camped at furthermost official campsite which caught more breeze than the inside campsites, but the monsters tried to carry us away.  Maybe a winter trip would minimise the relentless effect of these bugs.

Tides will rule your paddling in Pancake Creek around Neap and Spring Tides where the tidal difference can get up to 4 meters.  Our campsite had a sand platform with sea grass (hence the proliferation of sea turtles) which was exposed through the lower half of the tide cycle, requiring a long portage - but not insurmountable.  We were able to paddle against the tide as we were only dealing with a two meter tide difference during our stay.

The Ugly
The campsites and tracks are not maintained regularly by the National Parks.  There are no facilities and the majority of human users must enjoy wallowing in human excrement because behind every campsite is a field of crap.  I was appalled at the rubbish people were leaving behind and the lack of decency they had in burying their own excrement.

The tracks were littered with beer bottles and UDLs as they led away from the main campsite.  Not to mention people killing fish and leaving the rotting carcases on the beach putrefying - rather than either eating or catching and releasing.

There is a fresh water well behind the main campsite - I wouldn't go near it with the amount of excrement leaching into the water table.

Summary
Sea Kayakers don't need to camp at the main campsite.  There are multiple options which could allow remote camping around Rodds Peninsular.  Look for the fresh water seeping through the beach and in the rocks as there is plenty of fresh water available if you know where to look.

An exposed campsite will minimise the effect of camping with the midges and mosquitoes.

You have remote camping, boat only access, surf, rock gardens, oysters, great fishing and reefs in a picturesque location - in short a fantastic destination for sea kayaking if you can deal with the bugs.

Please note there is an excellent article in an online upstream paddle publication which goes into detail regarding the tide heights for getting into Jenny Lind Creek via Chinamans Creek and for short-cutting across crocodile country from the bottom of Pancake Creek to Turkey Beach (around 13-16 kms but you need the highest tides to achieve this short cut - noting that this cuts out paddling around Rodds Peninsular).  I'd advise reading in detail or your exploration may come to this....

Time for a new boat...

Well after a few months on land spending my spare time on the bike, I am about to get away for a week of paddling post Easter.  Thinking of packing everything I needed in the Nordy started me thinking about getting a new boat again.... a phone call or two later and now I have added a new Pace 17 Tour to the fleet.

The final decision came down to a price point - Taran V Pace 17.  The Taran, whilst being a bit more dynamic is also a lot more expensive given the current exchange rate, so much so that I couldn't justify it.

Hopefully I can sneak out for a paddle before we head off on Monday.  I'll post a trip report upon our return but the weather is looking sweet for a few days of kayaking, surfing, fishing and chillin'.

Have a great  Easter!