I have been to the cold North Atlantic and fear no man.

Last night's kayak guide training took us around Kettle Island, off Magnolia. i.e., the Atlantic Ocean. We're an eager, enthusiastic pod of kayakers, and the Guide-guides, an expert pair, skilled in paddling, guiding paddlers, and sharing their love of the experience.

But the Atlantic Ocean is big, and a kayak, even in a sheltered bay, feels small. Out there bobbing like a cork, or one of those bottles shipwrecked sailor stick a message in, the kayak felt really, really small. With a good five foot swell, rolling in across open water from Portugal we'd drop into the trough and loose sight of our fellow kayakers, only to find them paddling along right beside us as we climbed to the crest.

Reaching the shelter of the lee side of Kettle Island we regrouped and shared out thoughts. “What I kept thinking of” said one of my fellow guides-in-training, “was Paul Revere.”

“Pardon?” I replied. Thinking perhaps she was relating riding the swell to spreading the alarm, and also that she was a bigger history geek than previously suspected.

“No” she said, “before The Ride. The British were marching to Marblehead to seize their ammunition. Paul Revere (who apparently really liked to ride that horse) rode out to warn them, and the British were met by a militia of Marblehead Cod Fishermen refusing to let them pass and informing them that “We have been to the cold North Atlantic and we fear no man”

Yeah, hand-lining in a dory off the Grand Banks does put the fears of a suburban kayaker in perspective.