Rollin' in the River

Another day on the river. I spent more time than I expected, but I needed it.

I went down to the boathouse to go out on a trip. I assisted with two other volunteers plus our leader. we had about twelve members of the public and headed across to the Jersey side. We went up, and intended to go farther, but the wind and current not aligned well and were whipsawing us all over the place. Half my effort went to just keeping my boat straight. We headed up to about 80th street (we started out at 56th) and crossed back, coming down with the current.

I learned a lot about managing my boat in less than ideal conditions. I'm also getting my face around the boathouse seniors. I did get a little talk about staying with the group. I got out to far ahead a few times. I need to check the rearview more often and make sure I'm still with the group.

When we got back, I took a break and hopped out of the Chennai. I love the Chennai, by the way, it's an awesome boat. It's speedy and it tracks well. I wanted to try some rolling, so after a snack I went out in a Baja, which I'm more familiar with. I only spent about half an hour rolling. I got pretty good, but flubbed at one point and did a wet exit. I did well climbing back in, but by the time my buddy and I were done pumping the boat out, we were ready for some other things, so we chatted with another volunteer about hand rolling, and I plied around the embayment for a bit.

There was a huge arriving event - some sort of group trip from Albany, mostly folks in their sixties and older, plus a few extras for the last leg. Some of them had very nice, very fancy boats. We helped them out and walked them back to the lawn in front of the boathouse, then noshed on sandwiched. At one point I rode up to my usual spot to see how things were going, and later two more volunteers came up, so I rode back down and changed into regular clothes to go home.

I love kayaking. I really enjoy this particular club as well, and it's fun to ride a bike up and down the trail the city's developed along the waterfront. I learned a bit more about how the trust and authority structures are organized for different parts of the waterfront. It's really fascinating. It's remarkable what the city has done, compared with what was along the waterfront before.

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