Sunday, September 30, 2012

I was off in the southland attending a wedding and reminding myself why I live on the Central Coast.  John covered my but by writing up the following swim report;

Niel-- we missed you this past Sunday Sept 30th! There were 8 or 9 of us there--Sylvia, Brad, Bonnie, Britta, Lauren, Dale, Jeff, Robin and myself,  But gorgeous light, like you imagine the Mediterranean sometimes--bright fog drifting in and out, half there and then gone and drifting back, light fog, but enough fog to keep us from going out to the end of the pier, we also had no kayaks to accompany us. We entered the water around 11:10 and guessed it to be about 59 degrees, and swam to first buoy, there were huge rolling waves breaking onto the shore that made it great fun heading seaward, the largest I've seen at Avila in some time, and good sized rising swells farther out. We headed south to the last buoy, then waited to gather, then headed back towards the pier. Some were finished at that point and headed in, the rest of us were a bit concerned about going under the pier with the swells, but it ended up being no problem. We swam north to the last buoy before the creek, then we turned back, went back under the pier, and Brad and the Camarillo guy headed in, and Lauren and I decided to do a sprint to the next buoy, then we finally headed in. It was a gorgeous exit with the Sun fully out by then and the huge swells carrying us toward shore, and then the waves breaking over us as we exited. A wonderful exhilarating swim overall!
--John Hampsey