Saturday 11 June 2022 Cuttagee Lake

The last time we paddled our home waters was back in November last year and the water level was the highest we'd ever seen. Five days later on 19 November 2021 the Council opened the lake. About a week later the lake closed and on the 9 December opened again after a dump of 100mls of rain.  Since then, due to the wet year, Cuttagee has been regularly opening and closing again; sometimes with only a few days between opening and closing.

 Although the lake is still low the water was glassy and we decided to chance it and by 10.30am we were on the water.

Ooh, it was good to be out on Cuttagee again.  

Getting the drone ready to fly

This Sea Eagle circling overhead watched the proceedings and made L wary of flying too high.

While L flew the drone I watched the group of  swans that seem to have taken up residence in Little Cuttagee. With the drone packed up and the GoPro turned on we paddled cautiously up the shallow straight. The water was crystal clear, but sadly no fish were spotted.

As we neared the end of the straight we could see the bridge and beach were very busy with people making the most of the Queen's Birthday weekend.

Paddling past the end of the peninsular we

turned into the main lake and found that besides the abundant bird life we had the lake all to our selves. Bliss. There were relections to mesmerise; more swans, Little Cormorants and Pied Cormorants, Grey Herons, ducks and Kingfishers to watch.

Back in November we paddled across the top of this jetty.

We spot the Sea Eagle again.

Round the back of the island at the creek entrance I missed these swans taking off in front of us. BUT the GoPro should have caught it perfectly, or so I thought.....

After checking out Camp Cove we circumnavigated the island and pulled in at the entrance to Rain Forest Cove for a break and battery change.  It was then that we discovered my boo boo. Way back in the straight when I had attached the GoPro which was mounted to a selfie stick onto the back of L's boat I attached it with the camera facing backward!! Oh dear, all that lovely footage L thought he had of where we were going turned out to be footage of where we had been. :) :)

So for the rest of the paddle the GoPro was relegated to my head. 

Out in the middle of the lake was this bird  - can anyone identify it?

On the way home L did some more droning in the middle of the lake. After some editing here is the result (note in the video how shallow the main part of the lake is):

Here is a still from the GoPro of the Little Cuttagee swans taking flight, which you can barely see in the pic on the right hand side along the shore, more interesting is the circle of slop.

By the time we were unpacking the boats at 1.45pm the wind gust we'd encountered crossing Little Cuttagee had died away and the lake was returning to stillness once more. During our paddle we saw the Sea Eagles 4 times, a highlight of which was one diving upon and catching a fish as we had our break. I also had 5 kingfisher sightings, but sadly only one fish - two if you count the one the Sea Eagle caught.  On the upside we didn't encounter any jellyfish.

Trip Notes:

Lake closed, water level low.

See previous entries for more detailed information.