Yonkers - and then we went paddling

Great seeing so many of my old friends last night -- I hadn't been up there for a visit in a long time (such a nice place to paddle but a bit outside of my usual stompin' grounds) and the double-takes were priceless. Thank you again Jack for inviting me up and Pat for once again loaning me your boat!

Yonkers Yarn Bombing!

I was glad to have a reason to get up to Yonkers tonight - my fabric-maven friend Pat has been involved in a couple of yarn bombings and it was fun to get up there to see them. Click for slideshow view. 

Paerdegat sunset, 7/24/14, and getting the post-work paddle habit back into my life

I've been thoroughly happy about reinstating my post-work paddles this summer, it's so nice to unwind after work with a couple of hours out on the bay. I sort of lost them last year; just when things were winding down from budget season and year end close and the weather was getting nice enough to be out after dark, two co-workers resigned, and with the extra work, it got to be tough to get out of work early enough to make it worth the trek to the club (I get part of the way there and all of the way home by bus, so if I leave too much after 6 it makes for a really late night) and I ended up doing more post-work walks for exercise than paddles. This year, we're back to full staff and having a much more normal summer.

I didn't get myself back into the swing of post-work paddles right away - I'm a person who tends to stick to her routines, and once packing up the gear and schlepping to the club in the evening was out of the routine, it didn't get put back in right away - but I got motivated in July because I'm planning myself a little adventure (or maybe I should say a nice trip, my favorite quote of TQ's being "It's not an adventure 'til something goes wrong") in August, for which I need to be comfortable with long daily paddles, and it's been great. Last winter's weather didn't permit much paddling, and my sitting-in-a-boat stamina was noticeably low this Spring (especially when we did the Manhattan circumnavigation in May - I made it, but wow, it was long) but I've been getting out for twelve to fifteen mile paddles and I'm feeling much more like my normal self.

I haven't been taking my camera on these post-work paddles because I wanted to focus on the paddling, but for some reason I decided to bring it last Thursday, which was a beautiful day, and look what a nice sunset the Paerdegat dished up for me! I was drifting past the rings from my own paddle drips and took a couple shots with the camera held very low to the water to catch the ripples and reflections. Came out pretty nicely, I think.

I'll tell you more about the August thing when I get back. It's a pretty low-key trip compared to some of the spectacular expeditions various friends of mine have done in kayaks, but it's something I've wanted to do for several years, suddenly everything fell into place nicely for me to do it this year, I jumped on it as soon as I realized that was the case, and I'm really looking forward to it. That's about all I'm going to say about it for now; there are a couple of reasons I don't want to social-media-ize it before I go. For starters, believe it or not, August starts this week and I have got TONS to do before I head out!

Duck Redux!

This one's for the vegetarians! :D

Duck!

So much for catching up - you know how when you're planning a good vacation, one that takes a little prep time, there ends up being that moment when you go from "omg, it's never going to get here" to "OMG, how the heck am I going to get everything done in time to go?" with no in between? I've kind of got that going on with something I'm doing in August. Did you know that August starts next week? How the aitch-ee-double-hockey-sticks did that happen?

Anyways, here's a food post - I'd never made a duck before but I went ever so slightly berserk (slightly berserk - that's an oxymoron, isn't it? the whole nature of the Viking berserkers was that there was nothing "slightly" about them) at the farm stand my friend I. and I stopped at on the way home - in addition to the usual peaches, tomatoes, and corn (oh my) I got this duck, which I cooked as soon as I got home (there'd been talk of a Sunday paddle on the way home but the forecast was a little on the "meh" side so we hung out on the beach for an hour or so talking and watching the ospreys and then headed on home, so there was cooking time). 

I've never cooked a duck before but as I said to I., "I'm sure the Internet will tell me how", which it basically did (poke holes in skin, douse duck in boiling water, cook at x degrees for y minutes, and turn turn turn), although the improvised teriyaki/adobo basting sauce (shoyu, vinegar, garlic, honey, guava jam, ginger, and five spice) was mine all mine. Came out pretty,  didn't it? And it actually tasted good too. Not up to Chinatown standards, where I can go get delicious duck on a whim on my way home from work, but I will do it again.  Fun trying to cook something new and having it come out so nicely.

Another experiment from the farm stand - I splurged on some duck eggs, just to see what they're like. Sure tasted good over some leftover flatbread with manchego (standard camping trip rations for me, and I always get too much) and fresh farmstand tomatoes - as tends to happen, we got stuck in horrible traffic for the last 10 miles, it took as long to do that as it had taken to get halfway down Long Island. I think I got home about 3 or so, I'd had one of my peaches at the club for boat-unloading energy and I had to make something more substantial before I could face unpacking. This hit the spot (It's not actually burned, somehow the camera just made it look that way). 

I'd really gotten too much food at the farmstand but fortunately TQ was kind enough to assist me with the excess duck, corn, and tomatoes. Phew! 

Who's Got Big Bollards?

SHE'S GOT THE BIGGEST
BOLLARDS OF THEM ALL!

Who? Why, the Mary A. Whalen, my favorite retired tanker in NYC has got big bollards, and all kinds of other industrial-strength hardware too - and you can grab yourself a bollard (or whatever else you might want) this coming Sunday (7/27/2014) at PortSide NewYork's "Heavy Metal Fundraising Sale".

Click here for more info!

Eddied Out Again - Orient Point July 2014

Just hanging out, enjoying the scenery. 

At work, but my mind is elsewhere...

Catching Up - Liberty Challenge, 6/21/14, 3rd Race (Co-ed) from the John J. Harvey

It poured tonight, so I decided to do a little of that catching-up - I went back to my June 21st pictures, and decided to do a Flickr album of the 3rd race of the Outrigger Challenge.Click here to visit the album.  PS - bored? you can play "spot da huli" over there - I didn't actually notice it when we were out there but there's one upside-down outrigger in one of my pictures. Oops!

It was a total lucky break that I got these - I had gotten up early to go watch the women's race, and then my friend Harry was meeting me at the Historic Ships Festival one pier south of the outrigger festivities; my plan had been to get my dose of Hawaiiana first, but Harry wanted to go for a ride on the fireboat John J. Harvey, and by sheer coincidence, the trip I picked just happened to run us right into the 3rd and final of the 3 Liberty Challenge races, the co-ed teams, just as they were passing the Statue of Liberty/Ellis Island areas.

This race is the shorter of the 3 - the men's and women's races are both 15 miles, down around the Battery, up to the Manhattan Bridge, back south down around Governor's Island, over to the Statue of Liberty, up the Hudson to Pier 66 in Chelsea (the festivities used to be held there and I guess there was no reason to change the course when they moved to Pier 26) and then back down to Pier 26. The co-ed race cuts the loop up under the bridges, it's just down around Gov's I and back, bringing it down to 11 miles.  Couldn't have timed it better if I'd tried, and of course I went into full pa(ddle)parazzi mode. Got some decent shots, I think, it was really something to see. Hope you enjoy!

Visit the Liberty Challenge website at Libertyoutrigger.org for more info, and don't miss the video piece that the NY Times produced about preparing for the race with New York Outrigger, hosts of the event (with financial support from Hawaiian Airlines and others), click here for that.

Falling behind!

Oh, gosh, I need about a week of really crummy weather to catch up here! I was, as I mentioned, holding back to keep the City of Water Day post on top (that event went very nicely and at least one person came due to my social media efforts - always fun to meet somebody you've been Facebook friends with for a long time!), but now I'm feeling seriously backlogged (backblogged?). I have unshared pix going back 3 weekends now, eek, and we've got the insanely photogenic annual Orient Point trip coming up next weekend!

July 4th weekend was fantastic; there was the fireworks party at Victoria and Steve's - I shared my best fireworks pictures but I was going to do an Empire State Building selection too, with those new LED lights they put on quite a show - here's one: 

And then I spent both Saturday and Sunday at the club. Saturday I sort of accidentally-on-purpose "forgot" my camera, thinking of all the backlog from the weekend before - but we had a lovely club paddle to Spring Creek, where we got deeper into the marsh than I think I've been before, followed by hot dogs and burgers and wine (oh my) back at the club. Lovely day out there - a little on the breezy side, with the wind against us on the homeward-bound leg, but that just made the burgers taste that much better. 

Sunday was the 2nd Sailing Committee cruise of the 2014 season and for that, I did bring my camera. I love this old boat on Ruffle Bar, I always feel like I could post it and claim that it's somewhere in the Caribbean - although in this shot if a person looks closely there's a dead giveaway (click on the photo for a detail view).

We had a terrific sail, we had much better wind than we had for the first cruise, and the "Usual Suspects" were joined by a lot of newer sailors - this year's annual sailing class was apparently full of naturals who dealt well with some pretty breezy conditions during their lesson and then were willing to come back for more punishment! We ended up with 14 boats and 17 people, if that's not a record, it's got to be close - we had a great day out there, it was one of those days where the bay just feels like such an escape. Click here for a Flickr album of the day. Hope you enjoy!  

Throwback Thursday - Karen riding

I've actually been NOT posting this week to keep the City of Water day info up on top, but I haven't done much drawing since it got warm enough to spend time outside and since I got a whim to pick up the sketchbook last night and since it works well as a Throwback Thursday post, here's my sister riding at Camp Smith on Oahu. January 1975, according to my mom's notes on the back of the picture.

I actually started out trying to draw these brants, but somehow it wasn't working. Bowsprite says nothing is a mistake but I tried and tried and tried just wasn't getting 'em. Then I drew a horse face which came out kind of cute and so I decided to give the brants a break and do a quick sketch of my sister riding instead - that worked a little better.

 
So there's my Throwback Thursday post. Now back to looking forward - don't forget City of Water Day on Saturday the 12th - good wet fun all over the city, woohoo! 

City of Water Day - Saturday, July 12th

It's that time of year again! City of Water Day started as an event on Governor's Island - now it's all over the city. Here's the flyer that one of our graphicky folks did up for Sebago's event (click on it for readable version): 

For events at other locations throughout the area (including a few in NJ, this isn't just an NYC thing anymore), visit CityOfWaterDay.org. 

And yes, the original Governor's Island festival still goes on - featuring a cardboard canoe race that I consider to be tied with the Gowanus Challenge for silliest boat race in the harbor. Take a look at my friend Christopher's video from last year - this is what a person from Hawaii (like me) would call "plenty good fun"!

 

Fireworks Pix - A Baker's Dozen More

Well, the last one is all the boats heading for home up the East River, does that count? That was a neat thing to see. Click on the first photo for a slideshow view, I really did try to pick the best ones here!

Happy 5th of July!

Hope your 4th was great! As usual, click the picture for a better view. 

My 4th? Well, Macy's brought the fireworks back to the East River, and I'm lucky enough to have some kayaking friends who live in an apartment with a wonderful grandstand view. Also actually got some much-needed house-cleaning done earlier in the day - sometimes a rainy holiday isn't such a bad thing (and it cleared up in time for the fireworks). Excellent day. 

Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning

With our Northeast waters finally up to a pleasant temperature for swimming, this is a good time to share this article from maritime risk consultant Mario Vittone's blog again: Drowning Doesn't Look Like Drowning