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Fountainhead Foliage Paddle

My plans to paddle last Sunday with a Meetup outing were foiled when the trip got cancelled at the last minute due to high winds. The guy who was leading the trip says in his Meetup profile that he loves waves. I guess the kind of monster waves that get kicked up by light 9-10 knot winds are too much for him though.

OK, I'm being snarky. It had indeed been quite windy overnight but the forecast for the day was for the winds to drop -- and indeed the data from the sensor at Thomas Point Lighthouse showed quite benign conditions. But better safe than sorry, I guess, particularly once the water starts getting cold.

Bald Eagle over the Occoquan Reservoir

 The Meetup group's backup plan was to head to one of the reservoirs in Maryland where they planned to paddle with another (slow!!) Meetup group, so I decided I'd just head out on my own to Fountainhead Regional Park. I arrived at Fountainhead expecting to paddle solo, but to my pleasant surprise found my friend David L. on the ramp preparing to launch with another paddler (who was paddling a nice wooden boat). The three of us wound up kayaking together, covering about 9 somewhat meandering miles. The colors were not as nice as I'd seen in prior years (I think we were a little off from peak) but still quite beautiful.

It turns out there was another Meetup outing at Fountainhead that day - I recognized some of the cars in the parking lot - but we never saw them. They must have gone the other direction.


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justapaddler said…
...shh...don't tell anyone...but we felt the same way. We have never done the lighthouse paddle and were quite disappointed. I ended up paddling with the meetup groups on Fountainhead both Saturday and Sunday.
November 5, 2013 at 7:43 AM
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