Saturday, July 16, Ohio Street again

This was supposed to be the weekend we finally went to our Evanston beach. But the new or newly designed website for the Wilmette buoy, which gives almost real time data on wave heights near Wilmette, was giving a wave height of 2.3 ft early this morning. That is a bit more wave than we like to swim in the unprotected area near our beach. So we, Jody, Joe and I, went back to Ohio St, but I warned Joe that he could hit larger waves if he ventured out of the protected area and went around the curve. I was right, it was relatively flat near the Ohio St. beach but there were 2-3 ft swells past the curve. However, in contrast to the last time we were here the wind was light and the swells were relatively clean of chop. So it was quite swimmable and we swam all the way to Oak Street. There Jody actually caught some waves to ride, but Joe and I being less skilled at body surfing were not able to.

The water was about 68, a bit cooler than it had been. It felt chilly getting in, especially since the sun was hidden by clouds. But by the time we got going it felt great, we even had some moments of sun. Overall we rated this swim an 8 out of 10 and were glad we came.