glorious days of summer

Oh man. The sea has been ever-so-kind with gentle rollers, warm water and clear to the bottom visibility.... these last few days have been dreamy.  Today I solo-ed it for the second time in two days which makes me feel all high and mighty since this gal doesn't do that kind-a thing too often... but conditions have been epic.  Yesterday started off with a bang with honest-to-God,  LYNDEE down with sand between her toes at 10:30 AM!!  Sunshine (thats Sunsh for short) all sweaty and pumped up from spin class,  and of-course-Laura, our mighty LFTC!  Our route was wherever it was clear which was pretty much everywhere.... and then our fearless leader spotted this:  (for obvious reasons, I have a thing for spotted things....)

GO LAURA!!  Pacific Angel Shark..... good thing she didn't go in for a touchy feely, (remember when you did that Mighty Mer Cary?) they have a reputation for being quite aggressive and according to the guy at the Birch, more people are wounded from trying to touch these sweet fellas than all other shark injuries combined.

The rest of the swim was glamourous, with Lyndee working on her lung expansions and Laura and Sunsh taking turns kicking my ass at swimming in real fast... it was an aquarium like day to be sure!!  Round two was later in the day and clear and fabulous and wonderful too.... and nice to see our .25 buoy back where it belongs (more or less).

Lyndee brought some classic pictures to look at of her mom and dad back in the day... was that National Geographic?? Kevin was on cloud 9 reading and going back in time.
Vi, Lyndee's beautiful mother formed a group called the Sea Nymphs, details to come in the resurgence of this!!

Today, same as yesterday with a little Fall nip in the air... rumors were that things were less clear... but really? are we going to nitpick? its the best its been in ages, clear to the bottom, lots of floating bull kelp with fronds descending 12 feet..... swaying and drifting in the light... and not one HINT of red tide.  This girl has found her happy place, located about 2/3 of the way down, suspended in the midzone of clean clear water!!

Cannings are out of town, LFTC is out of town, Arno is back at work.... the rest of us are SWIMMING as we should!!

over.

Missed Saturday, not Sunday: Good Water Times

Need to post.
Saturday was painful and fun too. No swim was the pain. Bill went off to have fun with all yous and celebrate Claudia's day and I stayed home... for a good cause though -- a very special party!

Sunday morning wasn't going to be Tour of the Buoys... Party, Perseids -- what a night!  Sunday's swim was uniquely similar to many others -- where are we going? A-B-Corner? No, 1/4, 1/2, Corner! No, A-B-Corner and so on... Bill and Janie won and A-B-Corner in search of the GWBabyS-legend...

Did we find it? Nope! We found nice big leopards at the Marine Room, I saw lots of getting much bigger young baracuda, lots of fish and the cave. No GWBabyS-legend.  Let Claudia know we tried.
Great swim with Bob and Carol, Mark and Jo, the MCs, Ashley, Lyndee and not quite Diana, she went out a bit later with Lyndee's friend Lynn.  All good times... but here's the BIG deal, READY?

The MCs sat and listened to the tunes in the park for a while, simmering in the heat. Finally we said let's get back in the water, NOW.  So we had a wonderful no pants swim.  Nice... yes, it was very nice.
So that's my report... no pants swim in warm 70 degree water on a hot Sunday afternoon -- perfect!
~cary

Tour of Buoys, 2012

This will be a very brief post because there is little to report.  The weather was fab.  The water was flat and warm - 70.  The fabulous viz was wasted--on nothing to see!  For 2.5 miles of breathtaking clarity, all I saw was a couple of black jellies 10 feet down.  And bushels of those salp-thingys.  They were like so much flotsam floating on top of the water.  They were more plenty than seaweed.  I got a handful with every stroke some times.  I had to concentrate on not opening my mouth under water for fear of getting a mouthful of them.  They weren't yucky, just...OK, yucky.

The Tri Club did a great job of hosting.  From the breakfast munchies to the after-swim lunch.  Of course it wasn't all about the food...OK, it was all about the food.

I swam the 2.5 mi. in 1:17.  Doug swam it in...whatever.  My friend, Steve, too.  The first 5-miler finished in a blazing 1:39!  We left before the awards were announced, though.

Minute to minute swim report followed with Cookie Butter

Minute to minute report for Wednesday, August something or other. There is a birthday cake for Claudia, that's how I know it's August.
9am: I'm totally psyched about my swim for today, I am so going to rock this swim with my awesomeness, I can feel it. In fact, I'm going to skip the gym so I can really commit. You know, give it my all.

9:45: Stuck in traffic on the hill, on one side are giant trash trucks blowing black exhaust directly into my car, the other side are the are the tourists who are new to the planet and driving. My pre swim charge is at stake so I decide to use my overall pissed off attitude as fuel for the swim. That's right, ride that brake up the hill and go ahead, slow the f*ck down going downhill, I can take it.

10:00: Oh my God, what is going on? Why am I stopped? Where are all these people going? I hate the people and La Jolla. I put on my running music, it's all kind of hard charged, high BPM stuff, at least I'll be distracted while sitting in traffic. Damn.

10:10: Geez, finally! I peek down at the water on my way into the garage, it looks beautiful!
I'm back now, ready for my A game!

10:20: I grab Claudia from the garage, walk down and hear the report; aww, jellyfish everywhere, kelp everywhere, zero viz. I am not worried though, I'll avoid the Jellyfish, I don't mind kelp, we'll swim to Children's where it looks much cleaner.

10:30: I spot Ethan who is literally passed out on a bench, sweating his hangover off. Um, Ethan? Hello, you okay? He's fine as anyone would be after drinking until 3am, duh. I cannot see his eyes due to his tiredness. My partner, I'm so proud. We need to talk after this swim.

10:40: I swim out 100 yards and ran smack into a black Jelly, my entire arm snagged the sucker from wrist to shoulder. It's ok, I just need to get around take off, then I'll be golden.

10:45: The water is cleaner, way cleaner on this side but there is limited viz and a wild current beneath making me nauseous, ewww, I feel seasick! And, there are wicked cold spots which are shocking after the general 70 degree temps.

10:59: I wanna go back, I whine to Claudia. Claudia can swim in anything, she's just swimming along, unruffled by all, Ethan is too but for for different reasons.

11:10: I run into another disgusting black blob, this time my right armpit and neck. Gross and I'm stinging all over, my entire body is reacting with stinging sensations.

11:15: I'm sweating in the 70 degrees, I need to conserve! I'm dehydrated! What if I have an anaphylactic reaction! What is that? Something touched me!

11:30: Swimming across a minefield, kelp to the right, jellyfish to the left and in between lies the kelp/jellyfish nests. At least I am headed in, not even swimming now, just sidestroking and looking around for things that will hurt me.

11:35 I make Claudia collect trash from an infested kelp bed, it's for the earth, I tell her. She believes me and waded right into the mess to save the planet. I love her for this but I was so outta there.

11:45: I didn't even swim, I got wet and stung. And picked up trash. Isn't that like a scolding from your mom when you were a kid? Like some kind of torture?

12:00: I am in Trader Joe's buying large bags of snack food including something called 'Cookie Butter'. I have no idea what it is but it looked good and I had to soothe my soul after the trauma.
We ate coconut popsicles in the parking lot which was the hilight of my day.

There you have it: a minute to minute report.

lftc-out

just some of bill canning's birthday swimmers!
ralph, madison, grady, lftc, claudia, sunshine, bill, diana, anne, beth, phoenix, ashley, alexis, bill

Last week I ran into a distraught Cary in the parking garage, fretting and wringing her hands, all worried about her beloved Bill not having a swim group for his birthday. She sent out a little email but the real force was us peoples! The people who can sway the vote, people who can lure, at first with sweetness and if rejected can immediately resort to demanding, pushy, guilt trips and vague threats. Like 'don't make me come over there' and you know that's just scary. Even total strangers showed up, really! This photo doesn't show Wendy and her pal, or Teresa, a new girl I picked up from the sand. (it's just my way, people, I'm a swim floozy) Our group was far and wide today, we covered the cove with our awesomeness! 16 swimmers! Wow, really? I had no idea until just now. I guess that's how many of us it takes to fill Cary's shoes!  I know I safely speak for all the group when I say we missed Cary, Cami and Leonard and Lyndee very much and despite that, they can look forward to some bragging. Colorado, my ass.
I can think of one funny thing about the new girl,Teresa, she wanted to swim with us, she's heard good things, (who hasn't) but wasn't quite prepared for our love of distance, the zeal for adventure and the general hardcore. I mean, Dianadarling was present, it doesn't get more hardcore than Diana.
So Teresa kept stopping every 50 yards or so, popping her head up looking for the 'goal' and asking where we were going, are we there yet, where is it, what does it look like and so on. I kept telling her to follow the heads, go that way. She kept stopping though and kept asking the same questions: where is it? where are we? are we there yet? where are we going? which way? I could sense a bit of panic and I kept thinking that any moment now she'd get hysterical and start screaming; WHERE ARE WE GOING? WHERE'S THE BUOY? WHERE'S THE F*CKING BUOY? WHERE AM I? So when we finally reached the 1/2, she was out of there. Bye bye suckers, it was fun but later..
Wait until winter, woman, then complain. I wonder if she'll come back?
Thank you everyone for making Cary's plan work, for being the most beautiful and toughest swimmers around, for all your efforts to recruit or allow yourself to be recruited, for the effort to get there, it's not always easy. I love you all and let's do it again and again until we just can't. But don't be surprised if someone comes to tow you along.
lftc-out