Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Our paddle on Sunday may very well be the most memorable of winter 2014. We’ll remember it for all the things that didn’t happen – like, wind. Or wakes. Or frozen fingers. Or anxiety of any sort. We floated in an atmosphere of utter calm like we’ve never seen before. Not a breeze, not a boat. Just an eerie, otherworldly stillness. Air temperatures around 54F, water 34F.
We glided across the Sound to Sands Point, Long Island (40 52.001 N 73 43.760 W), passing the 1849 lighthouse at haunted Execution Rocks. The only boat wakes were our own.
A pair of silent barges appeared, up from the City. But even their usually dramatic wakes came at us only as glistening mounds of water—like rows of satin bolsters—almost indistinguishable from the sky.
No creatures were stirring except a curious seal or two. We did discover a beached whale, however, in sight of the NYC skyline…
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea!
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
After lunch, we rounded Huckleberry Island and headed for home. On this weird, windless day, patches of floating ice looked like tropical islands (the airplane view). Jim and Alex couldn’t resist doing some icebreaking.
Not far from HHYC, we came across a huge flock of birds (brant?) on the water. Thousands of them. They didn’t vocalize much — but the rustling of 10,000 wings sounded “like an old plane on the tarmac” (Alex) or “thumbs rifling through an enormous stack of paper” (Jean). Can you hear them? Click on video below and enjoy a Moment Of Zen:
2 Geeks @ 3 Knots 
Beautiful! We’ve had a few days like that over the years—but they are few and far between. Only in winter…
Thanks for your message, Vlad! We wish you both a calm (?) 300 miles in Florida… can’t wait to see you and Johna on the blog and in the City. Be safe, have fun!
Thank you!! But actually calm is not that good… please wish for a 10-15 knot wind from the north from Saturday until Tuesday or thereabouts, then becoming westerly… 😉
Haha, true! Calm water is WORK! We’ll put in our order for the weather you describe here. Good luck! 🙂
You have got to be kidding… Trick Photography or something… Maybe photoshopped the images.. Absolute glass… I have never seen anything so big and so smooth… Looking at your photos / video was one the best part of my day today!
No, honest! Just our waterproof point-and-shoot, no photoshopping. It really was just that weird. We couldn’t believe it either!! Thanks for your note 🙂
Wonderful!
Thank you, Toni! It really was a unique experience. Thanks for visiting us!
J&A
So beautiful! Very true: only in winter. And only a mad few willing to go out onto or into the waters in winter!
Hi there! It WAS like paddling in a watercolor seascape…
Thanks for much for the visit and comment. We adore your work! Still laughing about your “6 degrees of freedom and the drunken sailor” which we linked to in post https://2geeks3knots.com/tag/lighthouse-to-lighthouse/
J&A 🙂
Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed
The light-house top I see?
Is this the whale? is this the brant?
Is this mine own countree?
Jean — This is an especially nice post. But what happened with the beached whale?
Ed
Ah, sad story. It turned to polished concrete; we left it where it lay, among the faux corinthian columns and statuary at that LI home’s private beachfront. Thanks for your cyber visit, Ed! 🙂
This is a divine post! Love the quote and your images are just wonderful. So sad, to hear about the small whale….
Big hug,
Dina xo
Oh, Dina — thank you so much! Quite a compliment, coming from such a fine photographer as you–we are blushing, although the credit really goes to Mother Nature. We wish we could’ve gotten a photo of the seal that leapt out of the water, right behind my (J’s) boat–sploosh! And all those thousands of birds took flight (it sounded like a tornado!) but the video was ridiculously blurry… of all moments for the camera to fail!
Big hugs back 🙂
Indeed that was a surreal day on the Sound. And we owned it all! So glassy flat you could probably see our kayak wakes from an airplane. And tropical weather in between the sub- freezing episodes. Great paddling with you 2 geeks!
Great paddling with you, too, Jim! As always.:)
What a day, when all the wakes are from kayaks!? If your pics turned out, let’s do a Part 2. Hope to see you on the water again this weekend. J&A
Thanks for this lovely additional back up! 🙂 Mother Nature ist great, we all know that, but you have framed it so well. Oh, I’d love to see the seal…. but then again, I also love those very special moments. they come and go instantly, no time to capture it and I think it’s fine. Sometimes they present themselves and it is indeed a present. You two have a great hobby. Isn’t it marvelous, to have a partner that equally enjoys exploring, being on the water, being with you – one who shares what might come.
Enjoy your weekend, good music, good wine..
Best wishes, Dina