First week back paddling

This was my first week back paddling after the worlds. I gave it a week or 2 to recover from the various minor pains etc after 2 weeks of solid paddling! Even my elbow injury seems mostly recovered though I still have to wear a bandage.

I spent 3 days canoe camping around Strangford lough in the North. The weather was perfect for it with plenty of sunshine, clear skies and little rain. The only problem was the strong enough tides in the area I was paddling in! Strangford was rich with wildlife, there was seals and various seabirds everywhere though spotting a black swan was a very wierd experience. I would love to know how that ended up there.
I then moved up to the North coast for a day of surfing at whiterocks in my C1 playboat. The surf was pretty clean for most of the day with waves between 4 and 8ft depending on what part of the beach you surfed on. The only problem was occasionally the waves dumped resulting in some very long and deep wipeouts, the C1 does not have the speed to power through waves meaning I got hit much more than usual. I wish I had brought one of the squirt boats with me, it has been a long time since I surfed in one and it is nice having the ability to duck-dive and carve almost as well as the surfers.

Today I went down for the session planned on the sluice, it was planned as a freestyle development day with free coaching and was great craic with instruction happening and music at the feature. Having 3 C1 paddlers there for a change was also nice.
Now all that remains is getting the new squirt boat out somewhere decent and getting some downtime!