A Wet Run

Originally posted on October 7, 2014, by cruisingrunner

We are anchored off the island of Uoleva in The Ha’apai group in The Kingdom of Tonga. There is a beautiful white sand beach that extends around the entire circumference of the island, and I was excited for the potential of doing some beach running again. It’s better for my foot, after all. The weather has been overcast and cool, so I donned my capri leggings under my shorts and headed to shore on the paddle board with our hand-held VHF radio tucked nicely down the middle of my sport bra. It’s a “waterproof” radio that really doesn’t like to get wet, so I figured that was the safest, driest place to transport it as I paddled my way to shore.

The paddleboard I ride is a big, fat, sturdy blowup one that is quite stable; in fact, I’ve only fallen off once, and that was due to the wake of a panga (small power boat in Mexico) zipping past me. I’m pretty confident on the paddle board. I land it safely on shore in reasonable amounts of surf getting just my feet and ankles wet as I hop off and pick it up to carry it up the beach. In some surf conditions, I have learned to watch carefully for a while so I can time my landing with the smallest of the waves in the set. Today, the surf was almost nonexistent, just a little lapping on the shore, and I got careless.

I have read that, while at sea, people fall overboard more in calm conditions than really rough ones, because they forget they still need to be careful. Everyone dons a harness and clips in when the weather deteriorates, but most seldom do when it’s calm. I think this mentality is what did me in today as I tried to land my paddleboard on shore. The conditions were benign, and I let my guard down, and a little tiny wave turned me sideways just as the tip of the board touched the shore and I toppled off in a most ungraceful fashion. I couldn’t believe I was almost completely submerged in about 5 inches of water. The only part of me that stayed dry was my left shoulder, and my running shoes that I had simply placed on the top of the board went in as well. And forget about keeping the radio that was wedged down in my bra dry. And here I thought that was such a clever location to carry it.

Anyway, I arrived on shore totally soaked and cold, and since my running shoes were wet and sandy, I decided for a slow, barefoot run in the very soft sand. My calves will certainly be feeling it tomorrow.