Friday 30 April 2021 Little Cuttagee

 Being a month since our last paddle we were very much looking forward to today's outing to check out the state of Cuttagee Lake since it opened.

We launched our boats at 9.30am (1 1/2 hours before high tide at the entrance) but first we had to plough through the mud and the glutinous mass of two types of algae before the boats would float. 

Even with such an inauspicious start it was great to be out on the water.

Little Cuttagee was shallow and the water quality left something to be desired but these Ibis were busy foraging.

Turning into the straight we discovered that the tide, contrary to expectations, was flowing out quite strongly and we only got another 30-40 metres before running aground.

We sat and pondered our plight for a few minutes and discussed options. Neither of us relishing the idea of a long boat haul through the mud we back paddled -

until we had enough depth to turn and head back into Little Cuttagee where we rafted for awhile

and spied lots of medium sized jelly fish,

before heading back to our launch site,

where some serious power paddling was required to get through the algae gunge to the mud to end our shorted paddle ever - 30 minutes!