First Night In A Walmart Parking Lot, Erie Pa.

@Jenny1234 I changed to pants after people at Niagra Falls protested I was in a teeshirt and shorts, so went back to my van and got into pants and my long jacket.


Once I got to Lake Ontario I stripped back down to enjoy my day in the beach.

@Dignaga what part of Lake Ontario? Don’t go in the water

@Jenny1234 I went into it.
If you zoom in you can see three city downtown areas across the bay.

@Jenny1234 @Dignaga As a kid I actually learned to swim in Lake Ontario. Of course it was in the summer.

@Musicman My unit in Alaska used to go through water all the time in morning exercises in shorts and teeshirts in the winter. You learn not to fear the cold.

I was asked to disuade a soccer player to not join the military when I first got out of the military, so I loaded him down with a giant fossilized turtle I had and other random junk, and his mom brought us down to Cross Creek on the Ohio River in December, and the first thing I made him do was swim across the creek at near freezing twmperatures:




That's my initial dunk in to reassure the biology major that humans don't instantly go into shock in water just above freezing. Then I told him to swim across and I helped him. We spent the day hiking pass Meadowcroft Village along the railroad tracks out near Burgesstown, Pa, then in the middle of the night when I knee was giving out I informed him change of plans, we were hiking out to Beaver, Pa, and then down the Ohio River on the Ohio side back home.

He collapsed into a sack of shit and started crying saying he wanted his mother to pick him up, but I had his phone (he was carrying a super soaker practing infantry maneuvers from the Ranger Handbook and MOUT in abandoned buildings along the way, so I kept his phone safe).

He called his mom, promised not to enlist in the Marine Corps or in the Combat Arms of the Army in his first enlistment, but if he wanted to become a Navy Seal I didn't care (he would quit so no worry). She picked him up smiling while he sobbed and shivered on the way back home. He failed becoming a medic in the Air Force and now he is the Drone Strike King of the Air Force. Easiest job ever.

At some point you just gotta man up and dominate nature instead of letting nature dominate you.

@Dignaga Wow! I definitely wouldn't have done that swim. God bless you if you can. 🙏🙏🙏 Well, at least he learned his limitations before making a huge mistake. I hope he is happy in his career.