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Freya Resumes Circumnavigation of North America

Astoriadave

Astoriadave

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Joined
May 31, 2005
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5,611
Location
Astoria, Oregon, USA
Freya Hoffmeister attempted to make headway from Pacific City, some 15 miles or so south of Tillamook Bay, coast of Oregon, yesterday. This is a resumption of her planned circumnavigation of North America. Things did not go so well, but word from her is that today she will relaunch from that same location, after overnighting on the beach.

Quite the saga: http://freyahoffmeister.com/north-america/na-sec-1-north/fri-0903-2018-day-151/
 
You really need a small scale chart, spanning this area of the Oregon coastline, to appreciate the last two days of planning and execution.

Today was a classic Freya day, and a good follow-on to her run-in with the USCG earlier in the week. She covered a lot of water Friday, , slithering ashore on Heceta Head. Check out Friday's run. This is today's run, anticlimactic in difficulty, but with a twist at the end:

http://freyahoffmeister.com/north-america/na-sec-1-north/sat-1703-2018-day-160/
 
Is Freya still using the Point 65 'Freya' boats?
And supplying a boat to her paddling partner(s)?

Reading her blog, there's still quite a bit of boat maintenance going on...
 
John, I am not sure what boat she is using. Yes, there has been a fair amount of maintenance. I helped with some parts chasing while the boats were laid up here, but the most significant repairs involved adding glass cloth, with attendant resin, etc, over the midsection of the hull bottom, partially for abrasion protection, and an added bit to reinforce the rear cockpit bulkhead area of the hull, inside and out. A longtime paddler with more experience from across the river did that. She has not mentioned any problems with the hulls since she took off a couple weeks ago.
 
She is pretty darn hard on boats, and given that there is a lot of rock where she's been since she started this circumnav, and the fact that she regularly drags the loaded boat across said rocks, I don't think it's surprising. ;) I guess when your boats are free you can do that!
 
True about the rocks!!

They are light layups, to ease carrying, and used heavily in surf. The degraded area I saw looked like a failure at a flex point, not from impact. She has been complaining about this for a while. I begged off, and she hooked up with a guy with a lot more experience fixing boats. They got it done and did the finish sanding the morning they left for Pacific City, where her companion had a rough time and injured his wrist.

She really pushes herself. Boats, too.
 
Freya resumed her northbound segment in Alaska about a month ago, with a very skilled companion. The two of them are in the Aleutians, edging toward the main Alaskan landmass. This segment has some of the most consistently challenging landings she has encountered, as well as open, treeless terrain, well populated with brown bears. Here is a typical entry, unique in the acquisition of a hundred glass floats.

Read on: http://freyahoffmeister.com/north-america/na-sec-1-north/sat-14-07-2018-day-256/

Note: once loaded, click on the highlighted lat/lon data pair to bring up their campsite location in Google Maps. They are in the middle of nowhere!
 
Not sure. I think she said they were from Stirling? Not happy with their durability, but of course they get hard use in her hands. She and companions were using sister boats, I believe, hassling outfitting the cockpit each change in companion. Last summer she had trouble with companions who used their own, more traditional boats ... typically ones which could not keep up.

If you work through the last five or six posts, clicking on the Lat/Lon pairs to bring up Google Maps, sampling the coastline, you will see why they are having trouble finding accessible landings. No protection, few rocky headlands.
 
Latest piece from Freya, somewhere on the Aleutian Chain, after losing her own kayak to a shorebreak catastrophe a few days earlier. Click on the lat/long pair to see her location on Google Maps. Pretty much a featureless coastline. She gives some verbal description to assist in interpreting the Maps image. The boat broke in two at the cockpit. Now she is using her companion's boat, and continuing northward, solo. She escaped serious injury.

freyahoffmeister.com/north-america/na-sec-1-north/thu-09-08-2018-day-267/
 
After a stint southbound on the Baja coast this spring, Freya and new partner have resumed the northbound paddling of the Alaskan coastline. Just completed a couple days on Bristol Bay, bear fence and shotgun in play to deal with bears, ramping up for the big white ones. The partner chimes in now and then, admirably. Very lonely stretch coming up. http://freyahoffmeister.com/posts/
 
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