The Highest Tide in the World

by Eleanor Denston (New Zealand)

I didn't expect to find Canada

The ocean soothes as it cleanses anew. We are small boats floating, guided by forces beyond our control. Twice a day, 160 billion tonnes of water flow in and out of the Bay of Fundy, more than the combined flow of the world's freshwater rivers. These tides reach up to 16m high in the space of 6 hours. Sea kayaking at high-tide offers a unique experience inside the inlet cave at St. Martins, NB. Our departure at dusk, after heavy rain had set in, meant that visibility was low. A serene calm descended upon the bay as the rain melted into the smooth water of the harbour inlet. The emerald eye of the ocean dissolved each grey drop upon it's mirror-like surface, the portal to a hidden world below. Driven into the water armed with a spray skirt and unruly anorak, our hefty paddles weighted down either side of our tandem-kayak from the tugging current below. Seated in the front, all control relinquished to my companion in the rear, our sense of direction coupled with the weather left the ocean to steer. We bobbed along past caves of crumbling, molten, red rock cliffs with slabs layered up and gradually worn away over many years of the coming ocean tides. When we entered the open water of the sea, the crashing waves began to overwhelm our wobbly vessel and drove a strong sideways current. Repeatedly driven into the rocky coastline, breathing hard through salty lips stained by the howling winds, we battled our way back towards the inlet cave for shelter. Once inside, our guide, Nick, began to share stories of his life's motivation to help others realise their capacity for transformation through experiencing the cycles of nature. We exist in states of impermanence, our lives are in constant change. To know that we are like the windswept cave, sunken and craven at low-tide, a cavernous void that swallows up all manner of shells, lobsters, and seaweed. An echoing, debris-strewn tunnel was a far-sight to remember having seen earlier on that day. Only mere dregs of salty water that are left behind absorb to form numerous puddles and cracks which trickle slowly into the silty sand. Even after so many years, beyond fathomable to our existence, the cave is caught unawares as it transforms into this brimming fullness at high tide. Swollen with abundance and flowing movement, the seawater filters in, swooping and twisting to breathe life into the cave's innermost parts. The droplets of water from the sky and the flowing up of seawater from below enliven our skin and spark goosebumps as our bodies, now soaked and enveloped with moisture, seek to create anew. The cave is a roof that stands a mere metre over our head, a sharp paddle strike or ocean spray would be enough to touch its outstretched limits. Ominously aware of all the depths of water now contained beneath us, the cave swallowing up the very space we had earlier ventured upon by foot. Realise the cave. Realise that it is not empty, rather a container. A container is a complete object all on its own, an epic wonder, a magnificent beauty. As the sea reclaims its heritage twice daily, so the cave is worn and ebbed-away more and more each time. Its value does not diminish even as its materiality gently crumbles away. Was it the water that needed the cave or the cave which needed the water? The weather was abysmal, our experience astronomical. A container for the contained and the reclamation of a heritage. Our cycle was complete. However far we may expect to flow, life envisions a cycle that reminds us that we leave traces wherever we go. Nick recognises nature as our greatest teacher; as above the rain falls, so too the sea does rise below. Allow space for abundance to enter.