Half Saunter 2021

The pandemic has curtailed a lot of things, including the annual Great Saunter around Manhattan organized by Shorewalkers. In most normal years, several hundred people show up for the event. This year, the numbers allowed were strictly limited and participation was by prior registration only.

Shorewalkers also ran various smaller hikes under the title of ’City of Saunter’. I joined one of these, a modest eighteen-mile walk from the Staten Island Ferry Terminal up to Inwood Hill Park. In the event, I was glad I did: a year of semi-lockdown hasn’t done much for my physical fitness, and an eighteen-mile walk was quite taxing enough. I'm not sure how I’d have coped with the full thirty-two, which usually leaves me aching and blistered.

I’m not quite sure why I thought it would be a good idea to ride a Citi Bike home from Inwood (another eleven or so miles) afterward, on one of the hottest days of the year so far. Maybe I can blame that on poor decision-making induced by fatigue.