Those early mornings, by the way, were lovely. We were on the water by dawn, and the birds were just waking up. There was no boat traffic, save for a few shells from other boating groups, and most days perfectly calm, smooth water. By the time we got upstream to Spuyten Duyvil, the Palisades cliffs were cast in red by the rising sun. Someone was cooking bacon near the river (Applebees?), which gave us powerful hunger pangs. We rowed all the harder for it.
After weeks of preparation, we headed up to Saratoga, NY, for the Sunday race. The Head of the Fish is a wonderful regatta—big, yet well managed; competitive, but friendly; and lots of fun, as it's scheduled near Halloween, which results in many folks wearing costumes in the shells. (My favorite from prior years was an eight, with the rowers dressed in blaze orange vests and the coxswain wearing deer antlers.)The weekend promised lots of rain—in fact, the drive up took an extra hour due to torrential amounts of the stuff—but it had begged off by Sunday morning. Still, we had to contend with
the mud. Lots of mud. Scads of it! Wellies were the footwear du jour; flip flops served only to mire one's feet in the muck or flick spackles of crud all over the back of the legs.We had two boats compete: a mixed quad and a men's double. Neither boat had been raced before, and a couple of the rowers in them hadn't raced since college days. (How long ago was that? Let's just say they have never worn a unisuit.) Our team colors and uniforms have yet to be determined, so we opted for holiday-specific garb: orange caps. They were a tremendous help in identifying our rowers as they came down the course.
Though we didn't place near the top of our categories, we felt better when we learned there were former Olympians competing. (For real, Olympians—is that fair?) We ran into friends and other familiar faces. Manhattan College had trailered our boats for us; their women's double is shown heading back to the dock as our men's double charges down the course. A rower on the Williams College crew team had been in Jenny's junior learn-to-row group a few years back (he's even taller now). Coach Trisha and Martin the Brit were there to rally her Sarah Lawrence novices. We ended the weekend with southern cooking at Hattie's (www.hattiesrestaurant.com). Red beans and rice, fried chicken, jambalaya...yum.
All in all, a successful outing isn't judged to be one by how many medals you bring home, but by what a good time you had. We're already planning for next year.
