Making Waves on the Waveney

Having got a few short local trips under our belt, we decided to be brave and head a bit further afield. So a plan was hatched for a trip to the River Waveney on the Norfolk Suffolk border for our first full days paddle. James must have over heard us discussing our plans the previous evening and got us all up nice and early so we had no worries about in finishing in time.

With three portages and a full day’s paddle, this was our most ambitious trip we’d undertaken with James so far. We had only been on the river a couple of minutes when we caught a glimpse of our first Kingfisher, unfortunately James missed it as he was too busy playing with his lifejacket whistle. A few minutes later we were lucky enough to see a barn owl quartering over the adjacent fields, the Waveney certainly impressed us with its wildlife. As we paddled on James took his turn at map reading, luckily it looks like he’s inherited Daddy’s map reading skills and we got to our first portage without any trouble.

After a quick picnic on the river bank we were on our way again. I needn’t have worried about James napping in the canoe; within a few minutes of being back on the water he was fast asleep in the bottom of the boat. I think Jarvis, with the help of a few ducks and cows, kindly rocking him to sleep, certainly helped. James woke up just in time to enjoy the most exciting bit of the trip - the “jungle”.

The river narrowed right down and became overgrown with plants, our own mini jungle in East Anglia. Luckily Jarvis is as good at crocodile spotting as he is at duck spotting and with James on jungle bashing duty we escaped without any problems. We had a great day and have been inspired to try a few more adventurous trips with James.