Had a fantastic afternoon on the water on Sunday.

Did my first balance brace - the new kayak does indeed make them very easy.

Spent a few hours surfing in very clean waves - after a good blow to set them up, the wind flicked offshore in mid afternoon as a front came through, and the offshore wind held the waves up beautifully into clean faces. As the tide dropped the rides got longer and longer.

Only downer was failing to roll back up from the one time I got tipped over. Bit disappointing after all the rolling practise. The problem was remembering what to do - I clearly need to practise setting up underwater after tipping in in lots of different attitudes, not just rolling over already set up.

No pictures sadly.

Lots of admiring comments about the kayak though. Less so about the paddle - much scepticism about whether it really had the power to deal with the tides we get round here. It doesn't help convince people when they try it for a few strokes and find it fluttering all over the place. Lots of interest though.