First Paddle of 2007 Log

In January, it is still warm, maybe Al Gore was right about global warming/climate change after all!

It was a great day for a paddle, with a local bike/environmental activist, an eco-designer from Berkeley and a writer from Sweden we were an eclectic crew. The trip from the launch to the middle of the Harlem River presented fresh sites, from the crane barge filing the river with small stones for some reason, to the removed 145th Street Bridge, to the bare winter trees of Manhattan, we were rewarded with new vistas!

Here are two testimonials:

"Paddling with Friends of Brook Park in New York gives you a whole new
perspective on the city and its place in the natural world. You paddle
under bridges and past buildings that most people never see from the
unique vantage point of the water. You watch the tides ebb and flow.
People wave at you; tugboat captains shout "Ahoy!" and you feel you have
been let in on one of New York's recreation secrets."
Sam, Oakland, CA

"On the 2nd of January me and 3 friends went out on the Harlem river
between Harlem and Bronx in 2 kayaks and 1 canoe. Some of the first
sunrays of 2007 shone on us and the wind blew against us when we set out.
After passing under a few bridges, a flock of canada geese sat on an island
where apples bloom in the summer and ripen in autumn. A little further down a red
tailed hawk circulated high up in the air over our heads and over the
project houses on the Bronx side. We made a little fire by a cactus garden
on the shore before we went back downstream with the wind."
Robert, Goteborg, Sweden

More pics at: http://www.friendsofbrookpark.org/impressions/ecotoursandpaddles