Kayaking (v2.0)

I went home for two and a half weeks after finals and ate, slept, read, sat around the house, and went kayaking four times.  Twice on lakes near my house, and twice on the Charles River.

The first lake we went to was pretty small, and quiet since most (all?) access is from private residences.  We just happen to have connections in the right places.  One of my mother’s friends very kindly let us borrow kayaks, paddles, and life vests and launch from her house.  We kayaked out to one end of the lake, then on the way back, we encountered some of the strongest wind I’ve kayaked into.  It was consistently creating waves, which, due to the power of relative velocity, made you feel like you were travelling twice as fast, especially if you paddled in sync with the waves.  And then you would look up at the shoreline and wonder how you could expend that much energy to travel backwards.

Lake number one, with fancy lake houses on the shore.

The second lake was larger, and had lots of little islands.  Along the shore side of the islands, the water was absolutely calm:

We went kayaking in the afternoon of a weekday, so we didn’t see any other boats at all until we were leaving closer to evening.  On our way back to the parking lot, we saw a couple boats fishing, and a canoe.  Then just as we were paddling into the little cove/inlet where the launching ramp was, a whole group of motorboats came speeding roaring motoring out.  Good timing.

As for the Charles River, I’ve kayaked on it before, but always further upstream.  These times, we launched near to Cambridge and had to share the river with motorboats, crew shells, and boat tours.  Still a good experience, but I prefer it when the river is quieter.

Saw these guys on the first trip.

Saw this the second time.  Just like this.  Really.*

*Not really.  I know, you want my Photoshop skillz.