Softness Underfoot: A Run Up The Long Path

February 5, 2012

As I look at back at my running log, I have to go back all the way to November to find an entry wherein I ran in my trail running shoes.  This isn’t an indication of any sort of estrangement between myself and the trails that I love so much.  It’s really just a reflection of the task that lies before me – a 315 mile journey in May from the Adirondacks to Upper New York Harbor that will be primarily on paved surfaces – and thus, the need to train my legs for that very surface.

But deciding to give my legs a break from the pounding of the concrete and macadam, I scheduled a long run from New York City out onto the Long Path, which as many of you know is New York State’s answer to the more famous Long Trail in the state of Vermont.  The Long Path begins/terminates on its southern end at the New Jersey side of the George Washington Bridge.  From there, a runner could – if they so chose – run all the way to Thacher State Park, about 9 miles south of the state capital of Albany.  The trail twists and turns for 347 miles over some of the most difficult terrain that the Empire State has to offer, and I ran bout 25 of those miles myself a couple of years ago during my Harriman State Park trail project.

But the section of the Long Path that begins from the G.W. Bridge was new ground for me, and as I rode the “A” subway train north to Manhattan’s Washington Heights neighborhood, I looked forward to the run with great anticipation.     The route was an out-and-back, comprised of two primary segments.  Starting from a bus station on the Manhattan side, the first task was to cross the bridge.  Fortunately, there is ped path on the southern side that facilitates this.  Unfortunately, the ped path doubles as a bike path, so there are swift moving obstacles to be dealt with before getting into what I will call more “quiet” territory (aka Part II of the run).  Once you’re on the other side of the bridge, however, the beginning of the Long Path is right there, and quite easy to find, actually.

On this particular day, I  was substituting a 26-30 mile run on the city pavement for an approximately 25-mile run that would take me over the bridge, northward for about 11 miles on the trail, and then back again.  The turnaround point that I’d chosen was the New York State line, as determined by a point of interest on the map referred to as State Line Lookout.

As I started out on the bridge, the wind whipped, and I will confess to being just a bit uncomfortable.  But I knew that once on the other side and in the woods, all would be fine, for the woods would protect me from the winter winds.  In almost no time, I was in Fort Lee, NJ, and quickly spotted the teal green trail blaze of the Long Path.  I climbed a set of stairs, passed through what I affectionately dubbed ‘the cage’, and was on my way.

The trail segment (which comprised all but about 2 of today’s miles) was not as flat as I thought it would be.  Except for a half a dozen or so brief technical spots, the trail was runnable, but there were unexpected undulations along the top side of the breathtaking New Jersey Palisade cliffs.  But almost from the get-go, the views of the Hudson River (and New York City on the far shore) were spectacular.  The cliffs here rise more than 300 feet above the the river, making for a wonderful bird’s eye view, but also certain death should you end up going for a tumble off the edge!

As I traversed further north toward the New York State line, I was treated to views of Spuyten Duyvil creek, the North Bronx, the city of Yonkers, and ultimately, the small town of Hastings-on-Hudson, where views of the Palisade cliffs that I was running on are quite spectacular in their own right.   Along the way, I passed a mammoth building belonging to St. Peter’s College, and then in succession, two scenic viewpoints for motorists, both which were rest stops alongside the Palisades Interstate Parkway.  Further north, I passed Palisades Interstate Park  Commission headquarters, and then 2 miles later a small, castle-like stone structure (which looked like the rook of a chess set) designated as the Women’s Federation Monument.

By the time I reached the monument, I was starting to feel fatigued.  I knew I wasn’t at the state line yet, but unsure of how much farther I had to go to get there, I decided that I was close enough, and turned around and headed back toward the mighty George Washington Bridge.  On another day, I would make the push all the way to the state line, which as I discovered later, is approximately 1.3 miles further, and marked by a special monument as well.

The return trip was a fairly easy ride back over the same route that I had just run, and because I spent less time stopping to take pictures, went about 10 minutes faster than the the “out” portion of the run.   Passing all of the now familiar landmarks, the running seemed easier, and although I was getting tired, I found myself in a much more relaxed state.  And before I knew it, I was staring at George again in its mid-afternoon majesty, its western riser looking like a beacon in the shining sun.   As I neared the end of the trail and the streets of Fort Lee, the bridge appeared from a different angle, as if turning to greet me and welcome me aboard. And with nothing but a simple run of the bridge’s span left to my finish line for the day, I basked in the glorious views of the Manhattan skyline, looking forward to when I could do this run again.

The Case for Walking

I’ve had conversations on occasion with non-runners who tell me that they’d like to run, but that when they do it hurts their knees, or hips, or some other sensitive part of the body.  It’s my opinion that joints hurt initially because their body isn’t used to the strain of running, and their muscles simply aren’t developed enough yet to properly support the joints.   Realizing the difficulty in getting a non-runner to overcome this particular mental challenge, my advice to them would be “If you can’t run, then walk.”  After all, walking is reputed to give you 80% of the aerobic benefits that running gives, but with virtually no risk of injury.  This is good news, and it makes the case for walking difficult to refute.  And in my devious mind – the one in which I want everyone to be a runner – I know full well that once a person starts walking on a regular basis, the likelihood of their turning into a runner increases appreciably.

But what about runners?  What would be their interest in walking?  If you were injured, I suppose you might consider walking as a means of maintaining a certain degree of fitness while the injury heals.  But for whatever reason, most runners eschew walking, even under those circumstances.  Instead, athletes seem to look to swimming, the bicycle, the elliptical machine, or some other tool to keep fit during their recovery period.

Well, today I’d like to make the case for walking, and it won’t be a long-winded dissertation full of scientific study data and multi-faceted arguments.   I’ll make it simple, and you can decide how you wish to process my advice and what to do with it.

Walking is a fantastic recovery exercise, period.  And I say this not from reading books about running, but rather, from my own personal experience.    After a long training run of say, 20 miles or more, my old rule of thumb was that the next day was an off day.

Always….

I knew that the run had beat me up, and I was convinced that I needed to give my muscles proper opportunity to rebuild, to repair the damage I had selfishly done to them the day before.  Invariably, I would go out for a recovery run on the 2^nd day, and to my frustration, I was still unduly sore, and the run wasn’t fun.

But…………….what if instead of taking the next day off, you went for a good walk?  After a long workout, how would the muscles respond to a brisk 4-miler at, let’s say, a 16:00 per mile pace?

Well, the answer that I discovered is that the muscles respond quite well, thank you!  And although you may feel a little stiff during the first mile or so, before long, the quadraceps, hamstrings and calfs will all loosen up and you’ll be humming along like you’re having an enjoyable stroll in the park (which is the place I’d recommend doing your walk, by the way). 

This past week I followed up a 27-mile, 4 hour and 15 minute training run with a one-hour walk the next day, and it was a decidedly good feeling to be marching off a few miles after such a long run the day before.  By the time I was in my third mile, I was loose and happy and looking forward to my 6-miler of the next day.

So get out there and walk, folks !  Just do it!!   It is an exercise for runners whose time, I believe, has paradoxically come. 

“Fly” Me A River

When I was on a training run in Central Park a few days ago I was thinking about something someone said to me when I presented the river run project to the Orange Runners Club on January 4th. After my presentation, my friend Rob approached me and said “Todd, I don’t know how well you know the Adirondacks in May, but you’re gonna have a problem there – black flies!” I told Rob that as a boy, I spent a lot of time up in the ‘dacks (as we call them), and was pretty well acquainted with the black fly issue.

For those of you who don’t know, black flies are an especially annoying variety of flying pest, seeming to prefer mountainous terrain and the plant growth that is predominant there. The thing with black flies is that – unlike mosquitoes – they tend to swarm, and they don’t settle on you, get comfortable, and then inject a needle into you. Instead, the black fly bites, and it does so almost immediately. So imagine if you will a couple dozen of these pesky biters swarming around your face and chomping into you several at a time. This is not a pleasure.

Fortunately, the black fly doesn’t deal well with heat, which is probably a big reason why it inhabits the mountains instead of the lower elevations where human populations are more prevalent. With a few consecutive days in the 80s, the majority of black flies will actually die, leaving hikers, boaters and other outdoor types free of the black flies’ less-than-trivial annoyances. But the problem is, in the Adirondack Mountains, a run of hot days like that typically doesn’t happen until early July in most places, so my visit to the High Peaks in mid-May will be at the time of high feast for those nasty flies!

And so, as I contemplate my run of the Hudson River, I’m quite certain that the first couple of days, when I am dealing with standard mountain climate, will be a challenge for something more than just my legs. No matter, as I shall persevere. And I take comfort in knowing that my friend and event photographer Frederic will be with me as I traverse the banks of Feldspar Brook, Opalescent River and Calamity Brook. We will beat the crap out of those damn flies. ;p

“….a shiver in my bones just thinking about the weather”

January 15, 2012

Well, it seems that the dead of Winter has finally arrived, and for those of you who don’t live north of the Mason-Dixon Line or high in the mountains out west, that means days and night of temperatures in the teens (or lower) and wind that will freeze the drizzle from your runny nose faster than you can say ‘Jehoshaphat.’  The dead of Winter….where does that term come from?  I’m curious, but I’ll spare you readers the spoils of my research on this.

When I greeted the day today, Weather.com reported that here in Monroe, NY it was 12° F, with a “feels like” temperature of -1° F.  Ugh…. I had 18 miles to run beginning at 7:00am, and I could see that it wasn’t going to be the easiest long run I had ever done.  I remember a training run I did in February a few years ago in preparation for the Boston Marathon; another 18 miler, and on a day when the air temperature was in single digits with wind chills were in the -10s.  That run turned into a 7 miler instead, and I was hoping today wouldn’t be a reprise of that one.

I arrived at Elk Pen to meet my friend Micah, who had done about 19 yesterday, so was going out today not only in icy temps but on somewhat tired legs.  Upon getting out of our cars, we didn’t spend too much time small talking before hitting the road – it was just too dang cold to stand around, especially after stepping out of a warm car, so in a few moments we were headed up the hill that is Arden Valley Road.

All in all, the run route was a good one – a hilly but wonderfully scenic out and back that would take us 4.7 miles to Tiorati Circle, then 3.5 miles south to Kanawauke Circle, and finally about 8/10ths of a mile on Orange County Rte 106 past Lake Kanawauke before turning around and running it in reverse back to the cars.   The only problem was the aforementioned temperature.  I was carrying about a liter of Powerade in a Hydrapak, while Micah had two handhelds filled with some mixture that included Perpetuem.  About 20 minutes into the run, I opened the valve on my feeder tube and sucked some orange fluid through it.  Not thinking too much about it, I left the valve open, and within minutes I noticed that the fluid in the bite valve had frozen.  And more than just that, it seemed as though it had begun to freeze in the tube as well.   I tried putting the bite valve in my mouth to warm it, and put my heavily gloved hands around the lower part of the tube in a desperate attempt to unfreeze things.  But it was fruitless, and I now had to run the final 2 and a half hours with no fluids.  Given the conditions, I figured that I would make it, but it wasn’t the most desirable prospect I could think of.  Ah, well…

Micah offered to share some of his later on if I needed, but within another half hour, he found himself in the same position as me – frozen valves on both of his handhelds, and no way to unfreeze them.  And so, in 15 degree temperatures and some pesky winds along lake Tiorati and Kanawauke, we persevered, filling the time with good conversation and positive thoughts.    Before we knew it, the hours had passed and we were trodding down the last part of the hill leading back to Elk Pen.  It would be nice to get the car warmed up and flip on my seat warmers.   I was a popsicle, and my face had gonna so cold that I had begun slurring words as I talked to Micah near the run’s end, but it was 18 miles of running that only some mettle and perhaps a little bit of insanity had allowed to happen on this especially cold mid-January day.     I imagined how cold it must be up at Lake Tear of the Clouds today, but I knew I would see nothing of this kind of challenge as I traversed the mountain roads of the Adirondacks in May.

Hudson River Run 2012: The Game Is On!

Well, we have an official press release now for my upcoming Hudson River Run, so I feel as though we crossed the threshhold and that it finally seems “real.”   And I’ve got to start upping the ante on my training now, so will be doing regular long runs of 25 to 30+.  And word: these runs will be slo-w-w-w-w-w, as I need to learn how to run the very pedestrian pace (13:00/mile) that I will be doing during the event.

So anyway, here is the release that will be going out to the press beginning today!  I’m grateful in advance to all of you for helping spread the word about this extremely vital fundraising event.  Please contact me if you have any questions or would like to help the cause as more than just a donor.  Cheers!
_________________________________________

                     MEDIA CONTACTS:  

Richard D’Ambrosio, 917-679-2933 rich@hvcomms.com

Todd Jennings, 845-235-2788, todjen@optonline.net

 Monroe, NY Ultrarunner Charts Epic Journey down Hudson

315-mile run this May to raise awareness and funding for

Hudson River Sloop Clearwater

January 9, 2012, New York – Combining two of his greatest loves, ultrarunning and the Hudson River, Todd Jennings, 49, of Monroe, NY, plans to run the full length of New York’s historic waterway this May. Jennings is running to raise money for the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, an advocate for the Hudson and a vital participant in the protection of New York’s most prominent river and its watersheds.

The run will begin May 12^th at Lake Tear of the Clouds, on the face of Mt. Marcy (New York’s highest peak), and will finish at The Battery in New York City. The 315-mile journey will be comprised of eight consecutive days of running, averaging almost 40 miles per day.

“I consider myself very lucky to have lived 25 of my years around the Hudson River,” Jennings said. “I’ve enjoyed its majesty, from Adirondack peaks to watching the sun set over the Hudson while running down Manhattan’s Riverside Drive. The opportunity to give back through running, a sport that the Hudson Valley has enriched so much for me, is a great privilege.”

Jennings, an avid trail runner and a familiar figure in the New York City, Hudson Valley and Albany running communities, has completed more than 150 road races, including 10 marathons (26.2 miles) and five ultramarathons. In August 2011, Jennings completed his longest ultrarun ever, 43.5 miles in the Catskill Mountains. 

PROJECT GOALS

Jennings created “Hudson River Run 2012” to help further Clearwater’s mission, which is to protect New York’s fresh water supplies, particularly rivers like the Hudson. “We’re hoping that through increased awareness the community can continue to identify current and future threats to our clean water supplies, and empower people to create new programs aimed at minimizing future contamination,” he said.

All net proceeds from donations will go directly to fund ongoing operations and new initiatives of Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Inc. Funds will be raised through 1) individual “per-mile” sponsorships, 2) fundraising events created in association with the run, and 3) corporate and private charitable contributions. “We believe we can raise at least $50,000 near-term, but would love to set our sights on $100,000 before the run is completed,” Jennings said.

Said Jeff Rumpf, Clearwater’s Executive Director, “Todd is an inspiration to us. Running the length of our great Hudson River is the spirit and love we need to protect and restore her. The Hudson — America’s most influential river — is our natural, cultural and economic center. Todd’s run will bring awareness and focus to this asset and will raise funds to support Clearwater’s work building a new generation of environmental leaders for a sustainable future.”

Anyone can follow Jennings on his preparation and training for the Hudson River Run 2012 on Facebook, and at Jennings’ popular “Into the Woods” trail running blog, Todd Jennings is available for media interviews throughout the lead up to his run.

###

RUN TIMELINE

Date	From	To	Distance
May 12th	Lake Tear of   the Clouds	Newcomb	27 miles
May 13th	Newcomb	Riparius	30 miles
May 14th	Riparius	Glens Falls	45 miles
May 15th	Glens Falls	Cohoes	45 miles
May 16th	Cohoes	Catskill	43 miles
May 17th	Catskill	Marlboro	46 miles
May 18th	Marlboro	Nyack	49 miles
May 19th	Nyack	The Battery,   New York City	32 miles

 

ABOUT TODD JENNINGS

Todd Jennings is a lifelong endurance athlete and trail running advocate.  He has run ten marathons (including four Boston Marathons), four 50Ks, has completed the nationally known Escarpment Trail Run six times, and is the only person ever to have run all 240 miles of marked/maintained trails in New York’s Harriman State Park in one season. He has also served three terms as president of the Orange Runners Club (Middletown, NY), and makes his home in the Lower Hudson Valley.

Through his company City View Promotions, Todd helps promote endurance events and other endurance athletes like the internationally recognized Marshall Ulrich.

ABOUT HUDSON RIVER SLOOP CLEARWATER

Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Inc. is a 501(c)3 tax exempt nonprofit, member-supported corporation whose mission is to preserve and protect the Hudson River. As an organization, Clearwater believes its innovative environmental programs, advocacy and celebrations will continue to inspire and energize the next generation of environmental leaders.

Clearwater was founded in 1966 by folk music legend Pete Seeger. To this day, it remains the most vital champion and advocate for the Hudson River, partnering with schools and community leaders to raise the bar of environmental education again, realizing that this time the health of the Hudson River must go hand in hand with creating a sustainable world of green jobs in a green economy.

The Balancing Act

As is sometimes the case when I seek inspiration, I find myself situated at a pub.  It is a mild mid-December evening, and as Dylan Thomas was known to do so many times at his favorite haunt (the White Horse Tavern in New York City’s West Village neighborhood), I am sipping a delicious craft brew while punching out a few lines of thoughts and prose.

Almost everyone who knows me (or who reads this blog regularly) is well aware that I’m a runner, and as most runners that I know do, I spend the vast majority of my time expounding on the virtues of running. Well, to be sure, I often go beyond running’s virtues and try to share the beauty that I see in it with my audience. It’s something (the storytelling aspect of it) that I fancy myself as being reasonably good at.

But as I sit here at dba, a terrific and well-respected craft beer bar in the East Village, the story is not about running. Or at least I should say that there is nothing in particular about running that is beating at my forehead, trying to find its way onto the written page. No, the theme of tonight is different.  It’s something more than running.

“More?” you say. “Todd, the blasphemy in your statement! There is nothing ‘more’ than running!!”

OK, I confess, there are many days that I would agree with you on that. Running – to me, anyway – is so very empowering that I often have a hard time seeing beyond it. Our friend Kathrine Switzer’s mantra continues to be that running gives you everything, and with that statement I could hardly agree more. But even if running is capable of giving you everything, can it also be everything? I think we all know that that simply can’t be the case, for in this life, there is nothing that can be everything. In life, we need balance, and it is that very concept that I’ve been dwelling on over the past few days.

“All things in moderation” the old saying goes. “Jack of all trades, master of none” jests another. These are just different ways of expressing the idea that life needs balance.  But I would even take that concept a step further and say to you, my readers, that life is balance. The primary symbol of our legal justice system is the scales, which reminds us that with respect to our rights, fairness is determined by this balance of which I speak.

Opposites abound in nature, in business, and in psychology, and they seem to be there by some form of intelligent design, as if trying to teach us that there is much to be gained – and understood – by standing on the other side of the fence, by walking in another person’s shoes, or by weighing things on both one hand and the other.  I could go on and on listing things in life that naturally reflect balance, but to list them is not the point.

I do wonder, though:  Why balance? What is it about balance that is so damned important?

Well, I must confess that I haven’t figured out why, but I’ve concluded that knowing why really isn’t all that critical. What’s the most important thing to me is the understanding that balance is the key ingredient to the core feelings of contentment and joy. It is my considered opinion that the spice of life is not achieved by focusing on just one or two things, but rather, by exposing ourselves to many of the experiences that life has to offer.

One of my great heroes is a mythologist named Joseph Campbell. He was also a runner, as well as a teacher, and an inspiration to many through his writing and lecturing. And speaking of heroes, Campbell was one of the seminal minds in respect to the hero ideology. To Campbell, a hero wasn’t necessarily someone who did great things. He defined a hero as a person who lived a life that was true to both themselves and others. He also said – somewhat famously – that he didn’t think people were seeking the meaning of life so much as they were trying to see what it feels like to be alive. I’m not sure if this relates directly to the subject of balance or not, but I do know that Campbell himself lived a balanced life – he was a teacher, a philosopher, a writer, an athlete, and an explorer. And what he explored were the boundaries of the human spirit.

Personally, I know that when I am in balance, my spirit shines its most brightly, and so I will continue to seek out balance as I pass through each phase of life. And tonight, as I enjoy the taste of a delicious London porter beneath the vocal strains of Billie Holiday, I sense a balance, and it feels good.

When Runner Meets Water: A Day On The Sloop

There’s really nothing like the experience of being out on the open water.  I could try and argue that running into the deep woods is a fair comparison, but as I think about it with an objective mind, I’d have to confess that it’s not.  In the woods, there is protection from the sun and other natural elements, and you’re never really in any danger of being deprived of life’s essentials.   When you’re out on the water however, especially a large body of water where you could be very far from shore at any given point, much of that protection doesn’t exist, and there can be a sense that you’ll become stranded and not able to readily get help.

All that being said, I took my first trip out onto the water in many years on Monday, October 31^st, Halloween Day 2011.  The occasion was a sail with the Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, and it was an experience that I can only describe as memorable.  The owner of the sloop, the Clearwater organization (http://www.clearwater.org), is my charitable partner in the run that I am planning next Spring along the Hudson River to raise money in support of Clearwater’s ongoing operations and initiatives.  In order for me to better understand what it is they do (and what it is I’m running for), they invited me to come out on the boat and see what they’re all about.   I came away from the boat ride with an even greater sense of meaning for what it was I would be doing when I run the entire 315-mile length of the Hudson in May of 2012.

The Sloop spends April thru October of each year sailing up and down the river, with more than a dozen docking points from Albany all the way down river to lower Manhattan.  The sails vary in nature and purpose, with some being what they call ‘public sails’ while others are either educational sails set up with youth groups, or in some cases, private charters.  The public and educational sails have a purpose, and that is, to teach people about the river.  As Pete Seeger – founder of Clearwater in 1966 – tells it, if people are given the chance to go out onto and experience the river, they’re more likely to protect it.  This defines Clearwater’s goal quite well, which is to educate and empower the next generation of environmental leaders.

We set out from Pier 25 in Manhattan’s Tribeca neighborhood at a little after 9:00am.  The primary passengers today were a group of high school seniors from North Shore High School on Long Island.   The weather was a bit nippy, but the sun was shining brightly, setting the tone for a terrific morning on the water.  We began the trip using the boat’s motor, which I must confess, surprised me a bit.  I don’t know why I presumed the boat wouldn’t have a motor (a testimony to my ignorance), but I quickly realized that a sailboat without a motor would be a problem just waiting to happen.

As we moved out into the river and turned south toward Upper New York Bay, I felt the frigid chill of the wind and was grateful I’d dressed appropriately.  Some of the crew members appeared to be dressed quite scantily in respect to the temperature conditions, but when I heard one of them remark that they’d been lucky to have warmer weather the past couple of weeks, I felt quite the wimp for even thinking about being cold.

The sloop purred across the waves as we passed the splendid skyline of New York City’s recently maligned financial district, and then went on to skirt the shores of Governor’s Island – just a short ferry ride south of the city’s big island – before Captain Nick stopped the motors as we pulled even with Brooklyn’s Red Hook industrial riverfront.  Our first activity of the day would be to fish.  Two of the crew members stepped up in front of all the kids and described the process.  Following the instructional segment, they put the kids to task, engaging a number of the somewhat reluctant Long Island seniors in the process of tossing the big fishing net into the water.  After several minutes of trolling , the nets were brought back in with the catch of the day, which included many varieties of fish and crabs.  All of today’s catch would eventually be returned to their home in the harbor, but many of the sea creatures were put into a temporary makeshift fish tank for the educational session that would follow a bit later.

With the fishing portion of our trip done with, the next activity would be to raise the sails.  Never did I expect the raising of a ship’s sails to be so involved, but when you’re dealing with 3,000 lbs of weight and three pieces of sail material to hoist, it’s clearly a job, and not for those built like me (meaning of the chicken-armed variety).   Separating the school kids into two groups, one on the port side and the other on the starboard side, the crew then directed them in the rigorous job of pulling the main sail up the mast, foot by foot and – as it neared the top – inch by inch.   Upon completion of the task, huge sighs of relief could be heard amongst the students, and although I had been spared being involved in the effort, I was relieved in somewhat of a secondhand nature.

With the sails in place, Nick proceeded to turn the boat around.  We‘d been facing the Verrazano Bridge, the two and a half mile long behemoth that spans the Verrazano Narrows (which separates Upper and Lower New York Bay), but we would sail in the northward direction, giving us a spectacular view of lower Manhattan as we headed back toward Pier 25.    As the sail began, the crew split the kids into four groups and placed them into educational stations in each corner of the sloop.  One group looked at and discussed the fish that had been caught earlier, another studied the various ropes, and a third reviewed maps of New York Bay and talked about some of the history of the river in this region.   I can’t for the life of me remember what the fourth group was about, but some of the kids were gathered with Nick as he managed the ship’s rudder.  The handle of the rudder is a fitting piece of artwork for such a majestic water craft as the Sloop:  a hand-carved, clenched fist, emblematic of strength and courage, and harking back to the days of yore when seafarers faced the danger of not always knowing what lay ahead in their journey.

As we approached The Battery the skyline was a sight to behold, and all I could think of was how amazing it was going to be when I ran the final few miles of the Hudson River Run next May, seeing the buildings of the financial district and the 1,776-foot tall One World Trade Center building (still under construction, and scheduled to open in late 2013) waving me toward the finish line.   From the bow, I could see the building at 55 Water Street, headquarters of Standard & Poors, where my girlfriend Catherine has worked since the summer.  For a moment I recalled the article I had once read about the peregrine falcons that nest on one of the building’s ledges each Spring.

But the one thing that filled my soul the most as we rounded the island and sailed past the World Financial Center was the liberating feeling of being out on the open water.  Earlier in the sail, one of the crew members had told me that she’d lived her whole life on the water, and couldn’t imagine any other way of living.  As a boy from Central New York who favors mountain trails over ship lanes, I didn’t share her perspective, but I can say without the slightest bit of hesitation that I understood exactly what she meant.

The sail came to a conclusion, and when the boat was successfully repositioned in its berth at the pier, I smiled and reflected peacefully on this grand experience.  When I stepped off the boat and onto the pier, it was with a bit of melancholy.  I could very easily have been persuaded to remain on the boat all day, pulling up sails, tying off ropes, swabbing the deck, or whatever needed to be done.  As I walked away and back toward the street, I waved goodbye to the Sloop, at least for now.  I knew that she and I would see each other again in the Spring, and that was a nice thought.

Despite the feeling of melancholy, I felt so energized that I took it upon myself to walk all the way from Tribeca to Catherine’s apartment at 72^nd and 1^st on the Upper East Side, approximately 5 miles.  It was the kind of morning that deserved a long walk to reflect and appreciate the beauty of it all, and perhaps due to all of my excitement, upon arriving home it hardly felt like I had walked a step.

Water is the primary life-sustaining substance, the one that we can least do without, lest we perish.  And to experience the water the “Clearwater way” is to truly know and understand what the future of our water means to the future of humankind.    Pete, you were right.