Got in my first fully clothed swim this morning, quite unexpectedly. Temps in the high 40's in New England overnight so I threw on a hoodie and a turtleneck along with my jeans for a paddle just after sunrise. Glad I did, the fog on the water made it feel like mid October.

Coming around a small island I came across another single paddler, a butchy woman in her mid 50's just moving along at a leisurely pace. I found out fast that she liked her solitary early paddles as much as I did, and I offered to spread out to give her some peace and quiet, she told me company was nice once in a while. She must have enjoyed it because I hardly got in a word as we paddled upstream.

Hit a turnaround point after about half an hour and headed back. The sun was burning off the fog and mist and it was getting comfortable out finally. Layered up as I was it wasn't long until the hoodie came off, and a couple minutes she did the same thing. We were talking about some guys fishing as we floated by them and she casually mentioned that a couple days ago it was too hot to do anything and now we're wearing jeans and turtlenecks and hoodies. I pulled up my sleeves a bit and told her that the sweater would be coming off when we hit shore, if not sooner since it was warming up. She stuck her hand in the water and mentioned that at least it was warm, I checked it and agreed (almost bath water warm!)

The current carried us pretty well and the only paddling was to correct direction. As the sun hit us she lay back in her kayak and out popped both feet as she stretched out and put them out in front of her, talking about how relaxing it was without a single motorboat on the river yet. I paddled a slight course correction and when I looked back at her, she was "steering" with her right foot in the water, sneaker and all, apparently not motivated enough to sit up and actually paddle.

We were close to the rowing dock, maybe 10 minutes, and both of her feet went over the side into the water and I asked if she needed to wash her sneakers. "Probably" she laughed as she dragged both feet in the water, her jeans wet to her knees.

I thought about doing the same thing, but I hesitated and didn't bother.

We closed in on the dock and she told me she hated the balancing act trying to get up onto it, so she slipped around it to the ramp, beached it and stepped out into the knee deep water, exclaiming she was already wet anyway. This time I followed suit and had already decided I was taking a swim, solo or otherwise.

We pulled our boats and gear out and loaded them into our vehicles, and she just looked at me and said "I gotta take care of something" and walked away, down the boat ramp into the water up to her waist. It was clear as to what was going on, and while I would have been perfectly content to walk off into the bushes, I followed her into the river.

"What are you doing?" she kinda yelled at me. "Same thing as you" was my response and she laughed and told me to stay downstream of her. I did and I mentioned that the water felt nice, even without our "addition" to it and she agreed. She looked at me, back at the river, and back at me and said "Come on" and waded out to armpit deep water and began swimming. I didn't hesitate, and I caught up with her. We swam only a few strokes until we could stand again, and went up on a small island. With the little breeze that was blowing, we chilled fast, and the water was definitely warmer, so back in we went, and hung out there for probably half an hour, taking a break on the dock every so often.

We laughed and talked about our swimming attire and while I can't determine if it's actually a fetish for her, she says it's "normal" for her to do stuff like that and usually her girlfriend joins her, but she's more of a "foo-foo" and doesn't like getting most of her outfits wet.

We finally got out and went back to our vehicles, peeled off our wet sweaters and toweled off - she even took off her bra and laughed telling me she's sure I've seen tits before. Fortunately our hoodies were dry so that's what we wore to leave, both of us throwing our towels on the vehicle seats to attempt to keep them dry.

Before we parted I made a comment about hitting me up again if she wanted to wash her clothes while she was still in them, and her response was "I'll bring my girlfriend too" in a tone intended to make sure I knew exactly where she stood. What the hell, at least we had a few laughs and some actual intelligent conversation. I'll swim with her and her girlfriend if the opportunity ever happens! The way the forecast looks though, it'll be shorts or bathing suits for a long time after this. Bummer!