C.S.I Gower

On paper the weather conditions today looked perfect for a paddle, but where was I going to go. I know I'll have a stab at a paddle I aborted a few months ago 'Stupid o'clock'. Today however was going to be different.

Setting off from a deserted Oxwich beach on a lovely winters day.

As planned the conditions were perfect, the only fly in the ointment being that the tide will be against me all the way.

After a short while I make it over to Great Tor. I have read that this is the highest point on Gower, but I'm a little sceptical about that claim, more research I think. Despite that it is an impressive formation which towers over you, a perspective which is lost in the above photo, my camera does not (or more likely I do not know how to) take a shot with the same perspective as the human eye.  

Conditions are completely different to last time as I approach Shire Combe.

Passing Shire Combe the shoreline continues with jagged looking rocks, with nowhere easy to land, I'm glad I aborted last time. The solitude of this section was intoxicating, with the exception of the odd wave breaking there was silence, just pure bliss. I picked up a friend to, a Cormorant kept within about 30ft of me, diving as I approached and swimming in front of me surfacing either in front or to my right. I tried to take a photo but the quality wasn't up to much.
  

As I approach Pwlldu Head, the first signs of the industrialised south coast comes into view. The steel works at Port Talbot bellowing its cloud of horribleness into the atmosphere.

My target in the distance...

Approaching Caswell, time to stretch the legs and have a coffee.

Out with my new flask and at last a warm cup of coffee (Thanks Kate, the Turkey coffee is way better than the ham variety) I then noticed the house on the left and thought I was seeing things....

My other car is, well, a helicopter. How the other half live. By this time with the added coffee I was busting for a pee, there were a few people out and about here so to save any embarrassment I decided to pop behind a nearby rock outcrop. I was mid flow when.....

I noticed this, a severed hand and boot with a foot inside, ooops was I peeing over a possible crime scene, bet you don't see that happening on CSI Miami.

My boat was eager to get back in the water and so was I, Neptune was calling.

A little bit of messing around with the rocks on the way back.

The conditions on they way back were flat calm, almost like a millpond.

Passing Three cliffs Bay.

 Last push against the tide, heading back across Oxwich Bay with the sun starting to get low in the sky.

A final look back at where I had come from, made all the better with the glorious weather. Oh and by the way, the hand was a rubber glove with bits of seaweed inside which gave it bulk, no crime scene after all, phew.