Recycled Adventures: Night Kayak Sailing on the Hudson River

By Vladimir Brezina

Also in conjunction with my kayak-sailing post, here’s a slideshow of a kayak sail—or rather, paddle-sail—in August 2007. During the hot, humid New York summer, I much prefer to paddle, and sail, at night. I left Pier 40 on the West Side of Manhattan before sunset, sailed up the Hudson River to the Tappan Zee, then returned to Manhattan before dawn. A waterproof camera, mounted on an aka of my outrigger sail rig, automatically took a photo every five minutes.  These are selected images from the series.

Up the Hudson in the evening, there was little wind—the summer curse of New York sailors—so I had to paddle.  But then around midnight the wind increased from the south, and the return sail, tacking in wide sweeps across the empty river at 3 a.m., was surreal… At the end of each starboard tack, I emerged into the bright glare of the lights of the built-up eastern shore of river, then turned back into the darkness toward the distant black barrier of the Palisades. I paddled as well to keep the boat flying over the waves with that exhilarating sense of speed that comes at night…

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The individual photos in this series are here.