Weather is more important to sea canoeists than other canoeists, and quite often decides ‘whether’ we will do a trip or not. Most of us no doubt have a look at the weather map in the ‘daily’ before a weekend trip, but it is a better idea to start looking at them a few days earlier (I start Monday or Tuesday and cut them out and glue them on to one piece of paper) so as to get a better idea of the speed and direction the pattern is moving. Remember the map only shows what the conditions were like yesterday, and if you are planning an early start Saturday morning from an isolated spot, your weather map will be nearly two days out of date. Here in Hobart the Bureau of Meteorology is fairly handy and the Information Officer will supply the Friday 3.00 pm map late Friday afternoon (maybe with a small photo copy charge). This along with the forecast first thing Saturday morning on the radio should give ample information on the overall weather picture, but keep in mind that you can be subject to quite different local variations that won’t appear on the small scale map. A sea breeze can reach force 4 or 5 and your personal observations and knowledge of the local conditions may modify the general weather picture. There is no way anyone can do a ‘crash course’ in sea canoeing, as can be done in other disciplines. It takes many months of experience to gain the knowledge of local weather, tides, currents, etc.
For long range planning of trips the Wind Roses data can be obtained from the “Climate Atlas of Australia – Wind Roses” ($6.20 from the Aust. Govt. Bookshop). If you haven’t seen a wind rose it is a series of radial lines from a small circle. The combined length of all the radials plus the number in the circle = 100%, i.e. the example shown here represents 21% of calm, 23% of southerly, 18% of south westerly, and much lesser amounts from other directions. These are further broken down by line thickness and the southerly here gives us about 12% from 1-10 km/p/h. and 10% between 11-30 Km/p/h. and 1% greater than 30 Km/p/h.

These are the statistics for Strahan (Tas West Coast). A close study of the wind roses will help in forward planning, but as many people have found out, you still have the chance of the other low percentage of contrary wind, as found in the many attempts to circumnavigate Schouten Island.

Another point worth keeping in mind is that although sea breezes tend to blow straight in from the sea, after they have been blowing for a few hours then tend to back anticlockwise, so if you intend paddling late in the afternoons in the summer this may affect your plans, i.e. on the East Coast of Tas you would be better planning a trip from N to S to take advantage of a ‘following’ sea breeze, rather than S to N and have the wind on the nose.

A little common sense needs to be used in interpreting this sort of information, for instance the wind rose of Launceston does not necessarily give an indication of conditions on the coast because it is several miles inland at the end of the Tamar Valley and this valley has a large affect on local wind direction in Launceston itself.

There is also some sort of anomaly at Maatsuyker Island. I have been in this area with a SW gale blowing, yet the daily reports from Maatsuyker have given the direction as NW. These are the types of local conditions you should be aware of in your own area, and make due allowances for when making decisions.

The Bureau of Meteorology has all sorts of useful information apart from the pamphlets enclosed, and I suggest you contact them direct for information for your own state, Apart from the specific sea canoeing books, another useful book is J.E.Toghill’s ‘Manual of Yacht Navigation’ which is one of the few specially written for the Southern Hemisphere (Aust in particular) and includes chapters on the COMPASS, CHARTS, PLOTTING, TIDES, and CURRENTS, WEATHER FORCASTINGS, LIGHTS on the AUST COAST, and many others, and includes an extreme range table which I have found extremely useful in planning trips. This will give you a good idea of when certain high hills or lighthouses should be visible on long open crossings.

Another useful publication is the ‘Australian Tide Calendar’. The Tasmanian one gives the tides for ten places around the state, in graph form as well as the usual way.