by Joshua Colvin

The concept isn’t particularly new—especially not to Small Craft Advisor readers—but the more general outdoors crowd is beginning to figure out you don’t need to trek to the Himalayas or row across the Atlantic to have a satisfying, challenging experience in nature. More would-be adventurers, it seems, are recognizing that with the demands of work, family and other responsibilities, they may never find the time and money to schedule that grand expedition. Magazines and blogs are buzzing about so-called “micro adventures,” short, thrilling trips that fit in around work and family commitments.

Author and adventurer, Alastair Humphreys, is the most prominent voice of the microadventure movement. On his blog he offers five bullet-pointed reasons to live more adventurously:

• To experience the wild and escape from the rushed, mundane real world.
• To do something new, fun and different.
• To spend memorable time with your friends, family or by yourself.
• To challenge yourself, surprise yourself, and achieve something to be proud of.

The fifth is, of course, to put into practice the fun suggestions you’ve seen in his best-selling microadventures book.

Some of Humphreys’ microadventure suggestions include:

• Sleep in your garden.
• Swim wild—in a river, lake or sea
• Sleep under a full moon
• Forage for your food, or at least pick some blackberries
• Learn to identify a new bird or new tree each month

The list of possible microadventures is limited only by your imagination, but it occurred to me that our small boats are like microadventure magic carpets—perfectly facilitating our desires to be out in nature exploring, escaping, or challenging ourselves. How quickly we could make our own list:

• Sleep aboard your boat
• Sleep in your cockpit under a full moon—heck, even in your driveway!
• Row or sail to that shore or island and forage for food or pick berries
• Beach your boat in that tidal creek down the road and stay overnight
• Carry that dinghy, inflatable, or kayak to a nearby mountain lake or pond and be maybe be the first to explore it by boat

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about using our small boats to their best advantage. In fact I write about the topic and a recent shallow-water cruise in the coming issue (#94). I think we small-boat sailors sometimes have a hard time seeing the forest for the trees, or the estuaries for the bays, if you will. I remember when I sailed California’s Morro Bay being determined to push myself and my small boats by venturing out of the harbor mouth and into the open Pacific. I’d sometimes sail out and away from shore and then realize there wasn’t much to see or do. Now what?

Meanwhile the scenic, protected back bay—a tortuous maze of shallow channels and tidal currents—was teeming with marine life and just begging to be explored by a shallow draft boat. Today I regret I didn’t spend more of my sailing time back there solving my own little Riddle of the Sands and beach-camping the dunes.

Here in Port Townsend it’s a similar story, as nearby islands, bays and creeks offer endless opportunities for micro-adventuring, yet so many sailors race off under outboard power toward the San Juan Islands for a rushed, sometimes stressful few days of cruising. It’s good to stretch sometimes, but we shouldn’t forget that with a small enough boat, we don’t need a lot of time, money, or energy to have remarkable experiences.

What kinds of small-boat microadventure possibilities do you have near you? Leave a comment and let us know—maybe we’ll see you out there.

I hailed one of them to ask for the position of the Sunk Sand Buoy, which I could not pick up owing to the lowness of CHERUB’s side and the height of the sea, which had grown very much during the last hour. A man popped his head above the smack’s bulwarks, and, instead of replying to my inquiry, asked me what the ‘Hades’ I was doing off there in a little thing like that; and when I told him I was bound for Blakeney he grew almost angry, and tried to persuade me to run for Lynn, whither he was bound after he had made his haul. “‘Tis no place for any man to go for in weather like this, isn’t Blakeney. You come along arter me!” But I wanted to be in Blakeney, not at Lynn, and after he had told me that the Sunk Buoy had broken adrift, but that I was alright for the ‘Bays,’ I waved him farewell and left him in a sort of angry sorrow at my pigheadedness.

Along through the ‘Bays,’ which is a channel inside the Woolpack Sand, we had much less sea, though the wind kept freshening in squalls. The boat reached along beautifully — easy and dry — and I took the chance to get some food, especially as I felt rather downhearted after the fisherman’s warning, and I always find that things look ‘rosier’ on a full stomach than on an empty one. We were now dead to leeward, and when off Brancaster I pulled down the third reef, because I knew what awaited us when we should have cleared the Woolpack and be at the mercy of the full fetch of the sea across the Well. I had lost my proper account of the tides, and had no desire to get to Blakeney too soon. But there was no holding the boat; the full ebb seemed to be still with me, and the miles sped away astern very quickly, and early in the afternoon I was off Blakeney, much too far inside the Bar Buoy, and with a young flood tearing up towards the channel bearing me fast to leeward. It was now blowing very hard, and the surf to leeward making the air misty, everything looked as if at least an hour’s wait outside was imperative if we were to get inside safely. But, with the staggering sea and the strong lee-going tide steadily sucking me ashore, the boat made nothing at all to windward, and would certainly bear no more sail in the broken sea that was there.

I tried her on both tacks, but lost ground each time, and things looked very black. So, with my heart in my mouth, I pulled up the centreplate and pointed for the place where, amidst all the breakers, there seemed to be most water. On she ran, past the first outer buoy, then the second, and then, as she sank in the hollow of a sea — bang! she touched, and a walloping sea burst over her stern. But in bursting some of it lifted her along, and, as well as I could, I crawled forward and managed to keep her from broaching to with a long, strong boathook, when she touched aft again. The same business was repeated, but I felt that only a few more doses would fill her, and our last cruise would have been finished. Still, the strong flood tide kept her square to the sea, as she only hung on her keel, and after one or two more hard knocks she went over the Bar into smoother and deeper water, and, intensely thankful to the kindly powers that had preserved us, I ran her into the Pit, let go the anchor, and looked below. The water was just up to the floorboards, but the bed, stowed under the foredeck, was untouched, and the stove in its locker was dry and ready for action.

I have always felt that I owed my escape to the fact that the boat’s greatest draught of water was right aft, and also to the strong (six knot) tide that had held her straight. With a level keel or more draught amidships she would certainly have broached to and been rolled over by the tide and sea, and, as Blakeney Bar is miles away from all living beings, there was but faint hope of rescue, though the lifebuoy I had ready might have floated me to the sands, from which I could hardly hope to escape unless someone had seen us coming in, which I afterwards heard was not the case.

So, after returning the water to its proper place outside, I rested, refreshed myself with hot drinks, and waited for the tide to rise sufficiently to enable me to get to the quay, which would not be before dusk.