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mall boat, big trip. Tom and Vickie Matheson set out from their home in Wilmington in mid-May. Their destination – Washington, DC. And after that, Maine. Two people and all their gear.

In a 21-foot kayak.

On Sunday, May 18, five days in to the journey, they arrived in Oriental. The pair walked in to the Provision Company asking about a place where they could set up their tent for the night. Jane Wright pointed them in the direction of Grace Evans’ back yard near the kayak launch and the Wildlife Ramp.

Vickie Matheson, in Grace Evans’ backyard, sets up camp after 8 hours of paddling that day.

Their kayak is outfitted with a sail — a South Pacific canoe design made by Pacific Action of New Zealand. They used it for part of the passage from Adams Creek across the Neuse to Oriental, but then had lots of water action. “Water was washing over everything. We didn’t mind the wet,” Tom says. “We were just happy to be floating. “

Vickie Matheson shows the sail for their Chesapeake kayak. It is usable in winds abeam and downwind.

They found the wooden kayak on E-Bay about 6 years ago – the previous owner had built it from a kit. “The guy had made it, but he never went out in it,” Vickie says. “He built it, and we get to enjoy it.”

She and Tom have already have taken the boat, which they call, TurtleToo on trips, such as the Everglades and Florida Bay. This year, though, they are taking on something much bigger.

They’re able to take on this longer trip — because Vickie, who has had a hair salon and a day care center and worked in restaurant kitchens, has retired from all that, and Tom retired a few months ago, after 32 years with the National Weather Service, most recently at the hurricane office in Wilmington.

The paddle that Tom Matheson has used for more than 35 years. Vickie’s newer paddle is along the starboard side of their kayak.

It was a kayak trip that set him on that career path in the first place.

Tom says he started out as a white-water kayaker. Around 1973-74, when he was about 20, he set out on a 1500-mile paddle trip of the Great Lakes, with the same paddle he uses now. He paddled on Lake Erie and Lake Ontario and went on to the St. Lawrence. He was on his way to Nova Scotia “to be a lobster fisherman.” But after spending time in Montreal, and unable to speak French, he headed south, and home. Except for getting back to Smithtown, Long Island, he was aimless and by his description, didn’t know what he was going to do.

Then, on the Hudson, a lightning bolt. As kayaked down the river, near Poughkeepsie, a thunderstorm hit. Taking in the drama in the sky Tom says, he said to himself, “‘I think I’ll be a weatherman’.”

To do that, he went in to the military, opting for the Navy because it had “better options for weather stuff”. He spent time on an aircraft carrier — which he had not counted on — and eventually got his degree at Old Dominion. From there, he worked with the National Weather Service in Montana (forest fires were the specialty) and then New Mexico, and the mid-west, training others in Doppler radar. His last 14 years were in Wilmington, where he was the Warning Coordinator Meteorologist.

Tom and Vickie Matheson during their stop in Oriental.

(And in answer to the question: yes, meteorologists’ homes are not spared the wrath of the hurricanes they forecast. Vickie talked of having a roof fly off their Wilmington home, while Tom was at work, coordinating warnings about a hurricane…. )

And now, with none of those work obligations, they are taking this trip because they want to “do it while we can.”

Their life on the kayak is very simplified.. A 26-watt solar panel charges their few pieces of electronica: a GPS, a VHF weather radio and a laptop computer. The solar panel sits mid-kayak, and soaks up energy, with only the occasional shadow falling on it from a raised paddle.

Three forms of power on board the kayak. The paddles. The edge of the sail ribbing. And the solar panel, which, while it does nothing for propulsion, does recharge the batteries.

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Posted Sunday June 1, 2008 by Melinda Penkava

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