2023 SK102

SK102 is the Chesapeake Paddlers Association's annual on-water skills training weekend. I've attended, taught at, and written about it (search the blog for "SK102" to find past write-ups)  it many times. It's a geat chance to learn kayak skills for experienced paddlers, and it's generally just a great hang. It's held on someone's expansive lakefront property at Lake Anna, where 90ish people show up, camp, and play on the water.

While rain some time during the weekend is seemingly inevitable (my 2016 writeup is title "A very wet SK102"), this year was particularly rainy. The forecast for Friday was seemingly endless amounts of dumping rain, which was a real demotivator for me. I had just gotten back from a somewhat emotional trip to Brooklyn - a farewell both to the place and to my brother who, after living his whole life in the same neighborhood, is retiring and leaving the area. I moved away over thirty years ago, but over the decades I've still maintained a connection to the borough because I still had family there, giving me reason to go back and eat at my favorite neighborhood pizza place (the celebrated DiFara's), go for runs on the Brighton Beach boardwalk, and generally walk the old streets. Now, there will be no more Aronsons left in Brooklyn. Will anything bring me back there, or is my association with the place now merely history?

Anyway, I was completely unmotivated to head out on another trip and to set up a tent and in the pouring rain. Fortunately, my friend Rob was attending the event but not camping - he is recovering from a broken leg - and he invited me to stay over in his room at the decidedly inglorious Lake Anna Motel. Encouraged by the idea of dry sleeping arrangements, I loaded my kayak gear, camping gear (yeah, I still brought it), and music gear and headed south.

Upon my arrival I found a mess, thanks to the rain. You have to remember, this event is at a private home, not a place really set up heavy traffic and when large numbers of cars show up in the rain it turns into a muddy nightmare, with car traffic chewing up the lawn like crazy. By the time I got there they weren't letting any more people park in the instructor area, and the general parking area (a big grassy field which is actually a neighbor's land) was borderline in terms of traction. I was one of the last allowed to park there - everyone else had to park along the road or at the community marina.

I engaged in a somewhat soggy version of the usual Friday afternoon instructor socializing, and around dinner time they did go ahead with the instructor briefing - though moved to the property owners' porch because of the rain. The instructor meeting is also usually a pot luck. I had been eating pretty poorly in New York (c'mon, could I say no to a NY deli pastrami sandwich? Or a couple of slices of pizza?) and so decided I'd stick to my Thermos of goop (quinoa, sauteed vegetables, and pecans mixed with Simple Greens soup) rather than be tempted by the pot luck items. I did wind up accepting some fresh fruit from the pot luck, and when someone shoved a platter of oatmeal cookies at me I couldn't resist taking one. I'm a sucker for cookies.

Instructor meeting and pot luck

After dinner, there was some (somewhat bourbon-fueled) conversation with one of the other instructors, a fellow who is quite intense while also being possessed of an affable Southern charm. This guy is former Special Forces and is also kayak racer - both groups which attract some intense people. Somehow the group got to talking relationships and he mentioned, as he always does, that he has three ex-wives, then veered into creepier territory saying his current goal was to date women his (30-ish) daughter's age. As the evening wore on this led into some amiable if unacceptably  misogynistic "guy talk" amongst the crowd, which I felt was particularly insensitive because one of the female instructors was still there. Anyway, from there somehow we went to Robert E. Lee, with the intense dude mounting a defense of Lee - that the fact that he resigned his U.S. Army commission and went to fight for the Confederacy shows that he was a man of honor. The idea that he was perhaps dishonorable for having taken up arms against his country to defend slavery he brushed aside with some non-sensical whataboutism, asking how could we criticize slavery while we condone the current situation of opioid abuse, which effectively makes slaves out of drug users. Umm, dude, did any of us say anything in favor of drug dealers? Anyway, it was a nice piece of misdirection when backed into a corner defending the people who fought for slavery.

Eventually Rob and I had enough of our Jim Crow friend, and we retired to the barebones but out of the rain motel.

Saturday, after a motel room breakfast of Via Brew coffee and a leftover muffin from my New York trip (from Connecticut Muffin - yum!), Rob and I headed back to the event location. We had taken just one car to the motel, and upon our return we found the parking situation to be dire, as everyone was being sent away to find parking along the road, in the driveways of neighbors who had agreed to let attendees park on their property, or at the marina. While the sodden ground merited parking restrictions, the rain had passed and a beautiful day was dawning. I grabbed my basic camping gear from my car and before morning classes started I had time to set up my tent, cot, and sleeping bag.

SK102 waterfront, Saturday morning

For most of SK102's history, Saturday ran as separate morning and afternoon sessions, with attendees able to choose whichever classes they wanted for each session. Since COVID, it's been streamlined - students are in either the novice track or the intermediate track, and the same group stays together with the same instructors all day. I was paired with my friend Béla, an experienced paddler and good teacher. The class size was small, only six students, and more importantly, everyone was gung-ho. In the morning we focused on strokes and general kayak information; the afternoon is spent in and out of the water learning how to rescue yourself and others. Usually a class will have at least one person who is whiny and unwilling to do the hard work of clamboring in and out of the water all afternoon, but these students were all into it! I guess anyone who actually showed up to do an outdoor activity on a rainy weekend had to have been motivated.

Béla does some on-land instruction before we hit the water

After classes were done for the day I went back to my tent where I grabbed a beer, peeled off my wetsuit, and just relaxed in the tent for a while. I think I may even have dozed off for a few minutes - but not for too long, because I still had a second shift to work.

Saturday's dinner is always provided by the event. In the old days when Brian ran it, he kept the cost as low as possible, and so dinner was the lowest quality from-the-box frozen burgers and similarly cheap sides. Since Catriona took over she's been upping the experience, and this year dinner was actually catered barbeque. I didn't eat any of the meat, but they had Impossible burgers for the vegetarians, and I also indulged in cole slaw, mac & cheese, and veggies. A fine dinner, 

Sunday's classes had already been cancelled (more rain was on the way and the owners and organizers want to get people off the property before it once again became a slick mud bath) and so a lot of people packed up and went home after dinner. As usual, I was on tap to be part of the so-called entertainment, so I hung around and performed with the other musically inclined instructors - though to a much smaller crowd than usual. Dubside even got up and sang some Greenlandic songs, accompanied by pre-recorded backup tracks he had created.

The Chesapeake Pickers Association performs

The rain was forecast to return during the night, so when the performance was done I was faced with a choice - stay over and pack out wet gear in the rain the following day, or load out in the dark and drive home somewhat late at night - but stay dry. I chose the latter. By the light of headlamp and lantern I broke down my cot, tent and sleeping back and, after loading out the music gear (thanks to Jeff W. for giving the PA a ride up the hill in the owners' golf cart!) I put the camping gear in the car and headed home. 

So, a very atypical SK102, but the organizers handled the rain-driven changes in plans well, I think our students got a lot out of the instruction, and despite the rain a good time was had by all.