Kayak Cowgirl: Winter Mitsuwa

I recently paddled with some members of my club to Mitsuwa market, in Edgewater, NJ. It's a popular mid-range destination for our club, about four nautical miles each way. Timing with the tidal currents makes it a pretty easy trip. The trick was, this was in winter, December, a day after a significant snowfall.

I've mentioned it before, paddling there solo a couple of years ago.

Clearing the deck.

With temperatures in the 30s F, water about 50 F, everyone was wearing drysuits. At least one member was wearing one for the first time in actual conditions, and a couple others were relatively new to drysuit and cold water paddling. The wind prediction was on the high side - broaching F4 from the west - but turned out to be milder, and more from the south.

Shuffling to and fro.

Mister Cowgirl readies his steed.

We also had sunshine on most of the journey, so after layering up to meet the predicted wind chill, several of us found ourselves warm, in some cases overheating.

While we'd had several inches of snowfall the day before - incidentally, something I drove in briefly, making the rounds of various holiday parties - some was still on our deck, but mostly it had melted. We had "movie snow" decorating the cliffs and trees, but otherwise the water was indistinguishable from any other day of paddling.

Finally ready?

We did spot snow falling off the George Washington Bridge, as it was plowed off, way up high. We could see it streaming in heaps to the water below. That was kinda neat.

Five of us set out. Along the way, we met up with AA, another club member who'd been supporting a swimmer out for a photo shoot. That is, someone swimming in the water, without anyof our fancy thermal protection, near the Little Red Lighthouse, for about half an hour, just for the sake of some photographs. We were amazed. AA came over and said hello, but opted not to join us - he'd worked late the night before, and went back to get some shuteye.

We proceeded, and I found my first navigational challenge. This trip is easy enough to handrail, but one of my favorite marks is no longer in place: the Ferryboat Binghamton, a historic ferry later turned floating restaurant, abandoned years ago and long since demolished by hurricanes Irene and Sandy. Last summer, plans were finally executed to remove the old lady from her mooring, so I took a few minutes to figure out where we needed to go - past that wharf, or farther and around that long pipeline pier? It was the pipeline pier.