Polar Bear Club

I woke up this morning to beautiful light and slightly higher temperatures, ate a quick breakfast, grabbed my camera, and headed to Coney Island. I'll put together a photo tour post but I wanted to write about the Coney Island Polar Bear Club. They swim every Sunday during the winter and I happened to be there when they were taking their plunge.

A bit of background: I swam in high school and woke up every morning at 4 am to get to practice from November thru March. I'm not sure why I did this since I was never any good but I just want to make sure everyone knows where I'm coming from. I spent the winters of my youth freezing and then having to jump into a pool at the local YMCA. For me, swimming in synonymous with cold and winter.

So when I was wandering around Coney, freezing in my high tech camping coat, overpriced winterized hat, and bundled up to my eyeballs, I was shocked to see a large man walking towards me in a bathing suit. I had heard of the illusive coney island polar bear but had never seen one up close. He was very quickly joined by a whole procession of people in bathing suits!, carrying an American Flag, and parading across the long beach towards the water.

It was a very festive affair for the swimmers and the more experienced ones took the terrified newbies under their wing and explained to them how to do it and what it would be like. Hearing things like "Don't dive in, it'll knock your breath out" was enough to make me stand back and bask in the sun.

Perhaps the most terrified people on the beach were the families of the swimmers, huddled on the beach, whimpering to their loved ones about what a bad idea this was. The bears stripped down, donned their hats and neoprene gloves, did some opening exercises, and then ran into the water. Some swam, some huddled, most chanted and sang. A camera crew followed them in and an intrepid photographer in street clothes followed them in.

What was the most amazing thing was when they got out, they didn't sprint back to the club house but hung out on the beach chatting in their dripping wet suits, casually wrapped in towels. I jogged back to my car, put the seat heaters on, and thanked god that I had gotten all that winter swimming out of my system.