It’s just after 7am and the river looks like glass. Locals are walking dogs or jogging along the waterfront pathway, while others gather on a bench, cradling coffee and catching up on the morning’s news.
We clip up our lifejackets and slide into the kayaks waiting for us at the water’s edge. An hour from now we’ll be deep in conversation about wedding plans and restaurant recommendations, new friends made in the way only early mornings seem to allow. But first, we paddle.
This is Women on the Water, a women’s only paddling group from Kayak Noosa that takes place three mornings a week on the Noosa River. You can do one, or do them all. You’ll likely recognise your fellow paddlers, and you’ll definitely get to know guide Leisl Doery, who has water in her veins.
We cross swiftly to the North Shore and cruise gently past the long-held beach shacks that line the river’s edge. Simple houseboats bob on their moorings. A local paddles past and gives a nod. We pause to watch a pelican dunk its head in pursuit of fish, then glide our kayaks over the seagrass in the shallows as we pass Goat Island – one of a handful of small islets scattered throughout the river.
“The river has a lot of lessons to teach us,” says Leisl. “Some days it is calm and blue skies, some days rain and rainbows, and some days it is windy and turbulent but the river builds resilience and appreciation of nature’s ability to move slowly through life’s changes.”
Leisl knows something about pushing through. In a former life she was a chef, accustomed to loud, busy kitchens and the relentless demands of service. Then, four years ago, she went on a paddling tour through the Noosa Everglades, and something shifted.
“I asked what I needed to do,” she says. “Did a guiding course, started paddling with them.” She never really looked back.
Now she paddles every chance she gets – twice a week with Kayak Noosa, and other days, wherever the feeling takes her. With the Noosa hinterland on her doorstep, the options are many. Sometimes it’s crossing Lake Cootharaba to reach the tannin-stained waters of the Narrows in the Noosa Everglades. Others, she’ll paddle the gin-clear stretch of the Noosa River to where it meets the sea.
We paddle under the Tewantin bridge and nudge our noses into the calm of Lake Doonella. And we muse about Noosa’s status as a protected Biosphere, recognising its balance between the natural and man-made. This symbiotic balance is what continues to draw people to its waters, just as we were called this morning.
“Each person comes for different reasons,” Leisl says. “And sometimes the river and the people you paddle with give you something that you didn’t know you needed.”
Women on Water started about 15 years ago here on the Noosa River but it also exists in all kinds of iterations around the world. Today you’ll find versions of it built around surfing, bodyboarding and more, in communities around the world. Robyn Singh was instrumental in its early days and still guides groups of women on the water each week.
Originally sessions ran only on Mondays, drawing around twenty women. Then someone posted a notice on a community message board, and everything changed.
“We often have people who come to Noosa for three months each year, or they’ve moved here to start anew,” says Robyn. “With this, they can connect with the community right away.”
We join our new friends for coffee at The Jetty. Conversation drifts easily from wedding plans to restaurant recommendations, the kind of chat that only happens when there’s nowhere to be. The river glitters beside us. Nobody is in any hurry.
Robyn says the best way to experience Noosa is to simply slow down. “Don’t rush around – stop and meet the people. There’s just gold here,” Robyn says. “Everywhere.”
This is an extract from our Noosa Unhurried guide – download your free copy here.