Evanston September 26

The heat continues, another hot day predicted. Although there was some talk of wavy conditions that was not the case this morning. By the beach we had glass smooth water although there was some chop and even a few waves, boat wakes from far off boats? But the water was colder again, more homogeneous but in the 64-65 range. This is somewhat strange since all the reporting stations seem to insist that the water is still in the 70's. But for anyone who follows this blog that it is not unusual during an August heat wave for the water to drop from 70 on one hot day to 58 on the next. I have called this the "August inversion" where a west wind blows the warm top layer out to be replaced by "up-welling" of cold water from lower in the Lake. But this year our heat wave came in September and we did not really have strong west winds. So perhaps it was only a half-hearted inversion so only dropped the temperature by a couple of degrees and then only near shore.

As Jody and I were leaving a lone woman about our age swam into our beach with a safety buoy seemingly from nowhere. Since we were curious we greeted her as she came in an asked her where she came from. She apparently got in the lake at Lighthouse beach on the far north side of Evanston and swam the the 3.5 miles to our beach. She was actually relieved when we told her that the water was 65. She thought it felt cold but maybe it was just her and was glad to hear that it really was colder then it had been. And we were relieved to know that we aren't the only crazy ones swimming in the lake in late September.