April Swimming -- The "New Normal"!

The last several days of consistently warmer weather had a predictably salutary effect on the water temperature in Cold Spring Harbor, as Gae Polisner and Marc Leahy discovered yesterday in their Saturday afternoon swim, and Paul Coster, Sharon Hochberg and I confirmed this afternoon when we eased into the now-nearly-50-degree water.  A brisk wind emanating from the south rather than the usual northwesterly direction, and a vaguely unfamiliar underwater landscape -- a remnant of Hurricane Sandy -- were the only unusual features of today's swim, as compared to the "weird" and "disorienting" swim Gae reported in yesterday's Facebook post. She and Marc had faced what she described as an oddly circular current swirling like an eddy on the surface, capped off by an encounter with an unidentifiable headless creature on the beach when they finally made their way back to shore....(https://www.facebook.com/WestNeckPod#!/WestNeckPod).  Happily, all of the creatures Paul, Sharon and I encountered today on the heavily populated beach had heads, most of which were turned incredulously in our direction as we swam back and forth between the fenceline and the dock....Joining the many sun-seekers on the beach today were Pod cheerleaders Marc Leahy and his five-month-old baby Matthew (whose open-water debut we expect imminently!), Sharon's husband Mark, Gae and Carole (accompanied by our three French bulldogs), who walked the beach as we swam, and Joye Brown, whose puttering in the garden kept her from joining us in the Salt....

 

Paul dithering on the beach

Carole with Frenchies, and Paul, Sharon and I in the Salt
 

At the end of what turned out to be a glorious swim, Paul proclaimed himself ready to shed booties and gloves for our next open-water outing, which, if the weather holds, should be next weekend!  Carole and I will be riding in the 5-Borough Bike Tour next Sunday, so I'll be looking to swim on Saturday -- with booties and gloves -- but I predict that next weekend, too, there'll be swimmers hitting the Salt both days...and I'm sure I'll see you there before long! 

(Many thanks to Gae Polisner, who took all of the photos and video posted here!)