Day 3 – Marker 776 to Marker 730 (just below Lock 9)

A more relaxed start to the day having breakfast before setting off. The 10 km to Lock 9 went quickly and there was no fuss at the Lock 9. Fortunately I had mobile phone coverage and was able to ring the Lock Master (Danny) who was able to let me through immediately. I was on my again and covered 34 km to lunchtime. The second session I counted to 10 in English, Italian & French to keep my stroke rate up. This seemed to work as it helped me knock over the kilometres. My pronunciation deteriorated if I tried to paddle too fast.

The wind blew up in the afternoon – on one reach I was surfing down waves with the wind behind and then on the other side of the bend I was punching directly into the waves.

With 16 km to the next lock (Lock 8) I had to push to get there before closing time. I was lucky the Lock Master saw me coming just as he was about to knock off for the day. I had no mobile reception so it was doubly lucky. I was the only person the Lock Master had seen all day and he was the only person I had seen.

Pulled up on the sand in NSW

After going thru the lock I pulled up on beach on the NSW side. It was very windy and the 1st km after the lock was straight into the wind so pulled up on a beach on the NSW side. I had seen a beach on the map of Victorian side but the wind was making for slow progress so I landed on the sand. 

Beaches are ok for camping up to point – the sand failed to hold my tent pegs so I had to tie my tent to a 5 litre water tank to stop it blowing away. Later when the wind got stronger I dragged the kayak up so that I could use it to anchor the tent.

There were a couple of short, sharp showers that caused me to retreat into the tent. Unfortunately wet sand sticks to everything so there was sand all over my gear and in the tent. My totally waterproof tarp again caused water to pool under my tent during the night which meant that while I was secure from the rain above there were wet patches where the rain seeped through the floor. Fortunately I was mostly dry and slept well.