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Last month I went to an island called Namhae just off the south east coast of the country. It is a beautiful place and definitely somewhere I want to go back to.

The main purpose of the trip was to kayak! I was a little nervous leading up to the trip. It has been nine years since the one and only time I kayaked which was off the coast of Byron Bay in Australia. A wonderful experience but to be honest I didn’t do a whole lot. I was lucky to be partnered with the very lovely Australian instructor who did all the hard work and I just sat back and enjoyed the scenery. I did remember it looked like hard work though so I was a little concerned for this time. I am also a little scared of open water and was definitely worried about falling out of the kayak. Too much time watching Jaws as a youth. So this time there would be no handsome Australians to kayak me out of trouble. Just me and my mate Kristin to do all the hard work. But we’re strong independent women, how hard could it be?

Actually not too hard. For all my worrying we had a great day out on the water, and we didn’t fall in! We made sure that we got a good kayak, apparently we had the fastest of the lot, not that there was much evidence of speed with us at the oars. 

There is nothing like the sea air in your hair to make you want to sing a few sea shanties but seeing that all we knew was the same one line, “Yo Ho Ho A pirate’s life for me”, we quickly moved on to songs from the seminal classic The Little Mermaid. Those songs we knew all the words too. At least two years of my life were dedicated to that movie. So as we rowed our way round the coast of the island we lifted our spirits to the sounds of Under the Sea.

However our rowing did leave a lot to be desired and our steering was a little off, we did bump quite a few other kayaks. But that was through no fault of our own! Half way through the day we realised our rudder had been in the water and kept stirring us in the opposite direction we were always trying to go in, which usually meant we were about to crash into the cliffs or we were heading out to sea! So we had to exert even more energy to try and correct our steering problems. 

Despite the few hiccups, and the lack of sunshine, we did get to see some great scenery which we can see above. Legend has it that a dragon emerging from the caves in the cliff created the rock formation on the cliff. I had never seen cliffs like that before and it was great to see it from a perspective you don’t usually get, right on the water. We also got to stop off in one of the little caves for a little rest which was pretty special. 

Overall it was a great day. By the end I was tired, a little sore with wet feet and had salt in my hair and on my lips, but I couldn’t have been happier.