The gathering wasn't large -- maybe 30 people in all -- but considering that the temperature up on the highway was at one point 102 degrees Farenheit yesterday, it was surprising that five kayaks and two canoes actually came to the waterfront at the Red Dragon Canoe Club for the Summer Solstice Paddle for Cash Race.
Every boat paid a $10 entry fee, and half the money went to the club. The other half was to be divided amongst the top three finishers in a race, boat-for-boat, no handicapping, around a triangular course through the club's mooring field.
The first heat of three boats started at about 6 p.m. on this, the longest day of the year, lining up along an imaginary line in front of the dock. Race Director Bill Van Keuren waved each boat close to the line, the fleet facing into the current of a falling tide. When he was happy that all the boats were close to the line, Bill sounded an air horn and everyone sprinted for the first race marker, a large yellow sphere attached to a boat on a mooring.
An entire lap round the three huge inflated markers took six to eight minutes. There were two qualifying heats and then a race between the first two finishers in the respective heats.
The winner was a member of a nearby boat club, paddling a western Greenland replica kayak that he had built himself. (Or was it western Iceland?)
On shore, a cookout was underway, with burgers and dogs. And the meteorological gods favored us with a breeze off the river, so that no one was sweltering ashore or on the water.

Work aboard Robin is nearing an end and the day that she heads downstream is near. The electrician finished rewiring the mast yesterday. The windlass is mounted on deck. Today, in the continuing heat, I begin removing tools and trash and anticipate the day that our lady will be pretty, clean and ready to voyage once again.

Success! Robin has refrigeration. I kept a couple of cans of ginger ale cool this morning while I worked on the roller furling. That project was half done when I had to leave, but we'll be back at it tomorrow. The wind is blowing now perfectly for heading down to the sea -- an east by northeast breeze of about 12 to 15 knots that you could ride all the way to the Delaware Bay and the Atlantic. It has me dreaming!

The evaporator -- which is the ice-making part of the refrigerator -- is installed in the box and the lids are ready to be closed.

Today, I make the final connections to the compressor and, with a turn of the switch, everything should be cool aboard Robin.

Some may think our work is play. No, this is play.

The paddlers of the Red Dragon Canoe Club visited the New Jersey shore at Barnegat Bay on Saturday. Monica, in her flashy new life jacket, paddled almost as much as she talked with our companions. As always, she was, I'd venture, the life of the party.
There were 17 boats -- 2 canoes and 15 kayaks -- and 19 paddlers. Some were in their 20s, some may even have been older than we. The weather was sunny with a gentle breeze to keep us cool. The currrent was mild.
This was not a strenuous voyage -- only a few miles in protected water -- but it was completely pleasant and was followed by a cookout for luch at the beach house of one of the paddlers.
Another fine way to spend time on the water.

A wistfulness overcomes me when, crossing a set of railroad tracks, I pause to look, to see as far as the rails are straight -- to the next bend or the crest of the grade --and the disappearing tracks leave a question: What's beyond?
The same thing happens when I walk down to the river. Where we live, the river runs from the northeast upstream to the southwest downstream. In one sense, I know what's beyond: The mountains upstream, the ocean downstream.
But there is a pull nonetheless. I want to follow the water downstream, always and immediately, and when I cannot, I"m not fully at peace.

This is the mess caused by working on the refrigerator.

This is the new ice box, awaiting installation of the refrigeration.

We're crossing our fingers, hoping that it gets, and stays, cold.