It's Open-Season for Open-Water Swimming!

After a l-o-n-g, brutal winter that kept even the West Neck "Polar Pod" out of the water since mid-November, and delayed by several weeks the telltale signs of Spring, the slowly emerging crocuses and tulips and daffodils began to give hope of an eventual return to open-water swimming. The Polar Pod optimistically scheduled a "Resurrection Swim" for April 19th, the Saturday before Easter. But when the temperatures were forecast to go into the 60s this week, Annmarie Kearney-Wood was quick to urge us into the water sooner -- just in case the weather decided to go south again.

Five Polar Pod members took up the challenge, and on Saturday, April 12th, Annmarie, Joye Brown, Carole Wickham, Sharon Hochberg and I tiptoed, with winter-tenderized feet, over the low-tide rocks that poked and bruised even through our insulated booties.  The booties kept the cold at bay, but not our necklines, and when, one by one, we lowered ourselves into the 40-degree water, our wetsuits filled with icy daggers that sheared our skin and stung and burned our unacclimatized faces.  But the sun was shining brilliantly and glinting on the flat, calm water that looked so inviting....Joye reminded us that we'd swum in worse conditions in November, and when she said, "We can do this," of course we did!  It was -- as our cold-water swims always are -- incredibly invigorating and energizing, and the Polar Pod is all fired up to do it again tomorrow!  See you in the Salt!

Carole, Joye, Carol, Annmarie and Sharon

Basking in the sun and drinking hot tea afterwards