My first trip to Mexico I stayed in an all-inclusive hotel with my family. My mother certainly had an interesting birthday! But she also saved me on this trip. My sister and I had taken a sea kayak out on the beach of our Rivera Mayan hotel. It wasn’t much fun as the waves kept hitting us. So my sister turned around. I kept going further out, trying to see the island of Cozumel better. But as I turned around and attempted to come in, I realized frighteningly that I was stuck in a current…that was taking me further out to sea.
With all my might, I tried to paddle faster and faster, but I wasn’t getting any closer. And when I tried myself out, the current took me further away. I was starting to panic, and had images of floating all the way past the shipping lanes to Cozumel or out into the Caribbean. Still I kept struggling with my paddles in what seemed like forever.
But then I saw another kayak making a beeline to me. I was so excited and then I saw it was not a staff member, but my mother. I couldn’t believe it as she skillfully came up to me, tied me up to her kayak and brought me safely back to shore.
I was a bit shaken and had refused to kayak for years. It wasn’t until I had the chance to kayak Lake Arenal in Costa Rica that I fell in love with kayaking.
Lake Arenal was fairly calm and the current wasn’t too strong. I enjoyed paddling around! Someone had recommended I tether my camera to my life jacket. I was glad for that advice as at one point I did almost tip over. While I was able to right myself, my stowed water bottles escaped and sank to the bottom of the lake. But it was so calm and beautiful (especially after having white water rafted the day before) that I fell in love with it. Apparently kayaking isn’t so bad!
Serene and beautiful.
Travel Missteps is an every-other week series on how sometimes part of the journey is making mistakes and getting lost.
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