Evanston September 20

Looking back at old diaries the water was "in low 70's" on September 20, 1998. Today I recorded a 71 near the north wall so perhaps this ties the record for late season swims. A southeast wind today made it not too bad swimming to the north wall with 1 foot waves building to 3 foot chop. The large chop was no-doubt due to the waves being impeded by the wall. We were OK but it was quite an adventure getting away from the wall. I had wanted to go around the end to see the other side, but we had already seen the north side of the south wall, which was very calm. We did find that there was, as not unexpected, a northbound current. This made the swim back very long. In fact Jody opted to go to the beach instead of the wall, but I convinced her that we needed to check that the water was actually calm and did not just appear that way. It was calm. While we were finishing a lady windsurfer I had seen years ago had her windsurfer on the beach. She seems about our age. In spite of the relatively rough water she calmly mounted her board and took off into the lake. Its funny that while there were plenty of people out to enjoy this warm (going to 88) September beach day only us old folks actually went in the water.