If It's Tuesday, This Must Be Poland

I am reminded at times like these of an old movie of a similar title. At any rate, we're now in Poland on the Baltic coast, in the tri-city metropolitan area (and I use that term loosely) of Gdynia, Gdansk and Sopot. For you history buffs, this is the land of Lech Walesa the Polish labor leader who started his play at the shipyards about a mile or so up the coast from where we're staying. There's a large granite memorial on the pier commemorating his labor movement (I surveyed it last time I was here). The Gdansk airport is now officially the Lech Walesa International Airport. My room couldn't get any smaller. Well, I suppose it could. I HAVE had one room smaller than this, but it was in a tiny hotel in Tokyo. I haven't been in many hotel rooms smaller than my kitchen, but this definitely would fit into that space. Put it this way, I could sit on my toilet and work on my computer that's sitting on the table that serves as a desk. I could also work on the computer from my bed. It's that small.

As mentioned, we're staying near the coast, about eight blocks from the Baltic Sea to be exact. After lunch and a quick post-lunch nap I ventured out for a 45-minute run along the beach. There were people strolling everywhere, older women in fur coats and hats, older men in their wool coats and hats, young teenagers in love making out on a park bench (no wool or fur, purely synthetic), families kicking a soccer ball around, much of what you'd expect to find in the summertime along a beach. Only these people had many more layers on. I've run along beaches all over the world, from Florida to California, Australia, Portugal, Spain, all around the Med Sea area, Greece ... you get the point.

Until today I have NEVER run on a snowy beach. It truly was an exhilarating experience. The cold wind was blowing in from the north and every now and again the packed snow gave way to frozen sand. There were a few spots where I could run for awhile right down by the waves lapping at the beach. It became a source of amusement for me to move at just the right moment so as not to get my shoes wet because, as you can only imagine, it's pretty freezing in these parts at this time of the year. Normally in the summertime I take my shoes off at the end of a run along the beach and wade in the water. It's usually a refreshing feeling.

Not so much this time.

I thought about Ernest Shackleton and his experiences in the waters near the South Pole. No matter how miserable it would have been to get my feet wet, which would no doubt have resulted in something close to frost bite at these temperatures, unlike Shackleton I would have still had the luxury of a hot shower and warm, dry clothes awaiting me at the end of the run.

Life is truly good.