Sea Kayaker
Sandy Robson

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Retracing the Oskar Speck Journey

- Now Planning for Stage 3 -

A few years ago someone told me about a kayaker who paddled all the way from Germany to Australia.

Oskar Speck set out in his folding kayak on the Danube River in 1932. Seven years, 3 kayaks and 50 000km later, he landed in Australian waters. This has to be one of the most amazing kayak journeys of all time. I am going to find out.

My plan is to retrace as much of the Speck journey as possible over a series of expeditions during the next 5 years.

In between stages I will be working as a sea kayak guide and instructor. The route is explained well in this German TV story:

" I am not afraid of Pirates but I am afraid of not having enough Sponsors"

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Stage 3 - India to Australia ... Planning Now!

Stage 2 - India - Gujarat to Tamil Nadu (Dec 2012 - Mar 2013)

After being turned back by the government of Iran, Sandy bypassed the middle east and launched in a folding kayak in Northwest India at the beginning of December last year. This was the craziest part of the journey so far as Sandy found herself surrounded by entire villages of people, questioned by police, aided by fishermen, befriended by locals, made a protected woman by the navy and taken in by strangers. By February, Sandy had become the first woman to kayak the west coast of India and in four months she made progress around to Tamil Nadu, ready for the crossing to Sri Lanka in Stage 3.

Stage 1 - Ulm, Germany to Cyprus (May - October, 2011), 4224km

Retracing Speck's route, Sandy followed the Danube River (Donau) to the Bulgarian Border. The route then headed overland to Skopje and entered the Vardar River in Veles, Macedonia. The Vardar took her to the sea near Thessaloniki in Greece. Here she began island hopping in the Greek islands all the way across the Aegean Sea to Turkey. Sandy followed the Turkish coast to Taşucu and was supposed to cross from Anamur in Turkey to Cyprus, however, border regulations being a little different to the 1930's, she found she must go on a ferry to get to Cyprus! Sandy allowed 6 months to complete Stage 1 but travelled a lot faster than imagined, averaging 1000km per month. Checkout the online diary, it is a diary of travels by paddle and you can use the information if you are planning a sea kayaking trip in these locations. Hopefully there will be some inspiration and useful information for other kayakers.
*****DOWNLOAD THE STORY IN PADDLE MAG*****

For Sandy's previous trip website & blog visit: https://netstorage.penrhos.wa.edu.au/slap/

The Crocodile attack story is in June 2007...

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I assure you that the site is very secure and safe to continue to)

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