By Vladimir Brezina
Johna and I try to go out for a longish paddle every weekend. We don’t always succeed, but we succeed often enough that a backlog of trips that we have yet to post is accumulating.
Here’s one from early November. It’s strange now, in January, to see ourselves in these photos paddling without drysuits, and with leaves still on the trees…
Posted in Kayaking, New York City
Tagged Kayaking, New York City, New York Harbor, Photography, Sandy Hook
By Vladimir Brezina
Sandy Hook, NJ, a long thin finger that reaches out across the Lower Bay toward New York City, is an irresistible destination for a kayak trip from the city. But once Sandy Hook is off the bow, where to land? The perfect landing site can be elusive. Landing is nowhere actually difficult on Sandy Hook—there is a broad sandy beach almost all the way around (although the ocean side can have significant surf). But in most places it’s a featureless beach, offering no shade in the summer nor shelter from the wind in the winter. Parts of the beach may be off-limits for one reason or another. And besides, we want to have lunch in a picturesque spot, rich both in local sights and sounds and views of the landscape.
There is such a spot on Sandy Hook. A mile and a half down the bay side, right on the beach, there is an overgrown hillock—almost a little island, no more than a few hundred feet across, that is cut off from the rest of Sandy Hook by a salt marsh that floods at high tide. That’s where we like to land on Sandy Hook.
By Vladimir Brezina
NYC Swim‘s Ederle Swim, the ~17-mile open-water swim through New York Harbor between Manhattan and Sandy Hook, NJ, has become very popular. This year, there have been no fewer than three of them. And each one set a new record.
First, in June 2011, Liz Fry swam from Manhattan to Sandy Hook and back, becoming the first swimmer ever to complete a double Ederle Swim—and, in the process, setting records for both individual directions as well.
Then in August, Lance Ogren, swimming with a fast ebb current in the wake of Hurricane Irene, shattered Liz’s Manhattan-to-Sandy Hook record by almost an hour.
I was one of the kayakers accompanying both Liz and Lance on these swims (see my writeups and photos here and here).
And now, Round Three! Last Sunday we had the main, yearly Ederle Swim for multiple swimmers—19 swimmers started—but in the other direction, from Sandy Hook to Manhattan. The winner of this race was looking to beat Liz’s other individual record!
This time I was the kayaker for Janet Harris, in her very first Ederle Swim. Here are some annotated photos from my kayaker’s perspective. Janet has posted her own account of her swim here.
Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Sports
Tagged Ederle Swim, Kayaking, Long-Distance Swim, Manhattan, New York Harbor, NYC Swim, Open-Water Swim, Sandy Hook
By Vladimir Brezina
In my last post I wrote about paddling from Manhattan down to Sandy Hook, NJ. But paddling down is the easy part. It’s on Sandy Hook that unsuspected dangers lurk.
I remember a Sandy Hook trip of some years ago. (OK, I’ve just looked it up in my records and it was in September 2000—eleven years ago. How time flies…) Erik Baard and I paddled down from Manhattan and landed on the beach near the northwestern tip of Sandy Hook. We had a leisurely lunch, took a stroll along the beach, lazed about, and after a couple of hours were ready to paddle back to Manhattan. But just before we launched, we thought that we might, just out of curiosity, find out what those two big signs that stood there, facing away from us, said…
(I’ve never landed on that part of the beach since :-) But I’ve paddled past many times, and haven’t seen those signs again. The Coast Guard has probably relaxed its grip somewhat. Still, many parts of Sandy Hook remain restricted for one reason or another.)
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In the meantime, on the opposite, eastern side of Sandy Hook, there is another set of signs…
These signs mark the notorious Gunnison Beach:
In 1999, New Jersey passed a law that allows municipalities and counties to prohibit all types of nudism on state or local beaches in their jurisdiction, making Gunnison Beach the only legal nude beach in the state, since it is on federal land not subject to state or municipal regulations. Also, since there is no law against alcohol on federal lands drinking is allowed. Gunnison is the largest clothing-optional recreation area on the East Coast. The clothing optional beach, which offers dramatic views of Brooklyn and the Verrazano Narrows Bridge, attracts nearly 5,000 naturists per weekend in the summer months. Part of the beach is shared on a seasonal basis with a reserved breeding ground for the endangered Piping Plover, a native shore bird.
(Who says that Wikipedia doesn’t have a sense of humor?)
Sadly, every time I’ve paddled past Gunnison Beach it’s been deserted, except for one or two men who may have been naked but who also were largely invisible behind the barriers they had to erect against the bitterly cold wind… Of course, that might have been because I’ve paddled on the ocean side of Sandy Hook mostly in the off-season. In the summer, the whole ocean side is patrolled by rangers who order any kayaker who attempts to land summarily back into the surf.
So, Sandy Hook is a dangerous, and fascinating, place. And I haven’t even mentioned the crumbling military ruins, the guns, the missiles, of Sandy Hook—that’s for another post!
Posted in Kayaking
Tagged Kayaking, New York Harbor, Nude Beach, Restricted Zone, Sandy Hook
By Vladimir Brezina
On Sunday, Johna and I went kayaking. As usual, we looked up the tidal currents and went where the currents would take us that day. That turned out to be Sandy Hook, NJ.
The trip from Manhattan to Sandy Hook and back is one of our favorite trips. We do it often. It’s a full day’s trip but, with favorable current both ways, not overly strenuous: about three hours there and four hours back, with plenty of time between for lunch. I will give details of how to plan the trip so as to use the currents to best advantage in a future post. But in the meantime, here are some photographic highlights of Sunday’s trip.
Posted in Kayaking, New York City
Tagged Kayaking, New York City, New York Harbor, Photography, Sandy Hook
By Vladimir Brezina
NYC Swim‘s premier long-distance swim, the Manhattan Island Marathon Swim, has become an institution in the world of long-distance swimming. But its younger sibling, the Ederle Swim between Manhattan and Sandy Hook, New Jersey, is still growing, full of surprising twists and turns.
In October 2010, the top two finishers in the Ederle Swim were Lance Ogren and Liz Fry. This year, each of them went on to swim their own exclusive version of the Ederle Swim. In June 2011, Liz completed an unprecedented 35-mile double Ederle Swim from Manhattan to Sandy Hook and back. In an amazing swim, she set records not only for the overall course but for each of the two individual directions as well.
A few days ago, in August 2011, Lance set out to break the record—now Liz’s record—for the Manhattan to Sandy Hook direction.
I was one of the two kayakers accompanying Lance on his swim. Here are some photos and a brief account.
Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Sports
Tagged Ederle Swim, Hurricane Irene, Kayaking, Long-Distance Swim, Manhattan, New York City, New York Harbor, NYC Swim, Open-Water Swim, Sandy Hook
By Vladimir Brezina
In October 2010, Liz Fry swam in NYC Swim‘s Ederle Swim, a 17.5-mile tide-assisted swim through New York Harbor from Manhattan to Sandy Hook, New Jersey. Yet when she reached Sandy Hook, she wasn’t all that tired. As all the swimmers were getting onto their accompanying motor boats to return to Manhattan, Liz thought to herself, “Isn’t the tide soon going to turn back toward Manhattan again? Why don’t I just swim back?” And so in 2011 she did.
On June 14, 2011, Liz became the first person ever to complete a Two-Way Ederle Swim, the 35-mile swim from Manhattan to Sandy Hook and back again, in 11 hours, 5 minutes, and 7 seconds. And on top of that, she set new records for each direction. She made it from Manhattan to Sandy Hook in just 4 hours, 59 minutes, 6 seconds, beating her 2010 time and, by 7 minutes, the previous record of Tammy van Wisse of Australia. And she made it back in just 6 hours, 6 minutes, 1 second—also a record, and not a bad time for someone who had already completed a 17.5-mile swim!
I was one of the two kayakers who accompanied Liz as she completed this feat. Here’s the swim from a kayaker’s perspective:
Posted in Kayaking, New York City, Sports
Tagged Ederle Swim, Kayaking, Long-Distance Swim, Manhattan, New York Harbor, NYC Swim, Open-Water Swim, Sandy Hook
... kayaked the waters around New York for more than 15 years in his red Feathercraft folding kayak. He was originally from (the former) Czechoslovakia and lived in the U.K. and California before settling down in New York. He was a neuroscientist at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City. He died in 2016.
... is a kayaker and technology researcher at Nemertes Research. She's an erstwhile engineer, particle physicist, and science fiction writer. She was born in California and has lived in Italy, Norway, Hawaii, and a few other places. She currently resides in New York City.
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Wind Against Current 