In a never ending quest to find things to entertain myself whilst doing basically nothing, my pal Pete and I traveled to the Corning Preserve in Albany NY today for a short hike along the Hudson River. We initially had intended to hike a trail in the Rensselaer Technology Park, but that proved to be a giant pit of mud. Instead, Pete mentioned that the Corning Preserve had a beautiful paved path with scenic views of the Hudson River. It wasn’t all fun and games though, as I had a hidden agenda to scope out the fishing potential. It’s that time of year again wherein the striped bass make their migration up the Hudson in search of female companionship as well as to gobble up the Hering that inhabit the tributaries.
One of the joys of retirement is spending time with your friends and talking about anything but your former work life. With each passing adventure, those thoughts are gradually fading from my memory. My work life was filled with technical minutia and I am more than happy to let that gradually fade into a distant dream. My little walks with Pete are quite often accompanied by deep philosophical and political discussions. Today was no different as we walked through our long history of injuries and ailments, interspersed with lamentations about the current state of the COVID pandemic and the sorry state of affairs in Ukraine. We didn’t solve any of the world’s problems, as we never do. Sometimes these discussions end in detent and sometimes they end with long periods of silence. Today was a little bit of both. I was more distracted by thoughts of the gigantic striped bass I’d someday be pulling from the river alongside the path.
We walked about two miles up the river before encountering more mud and turning back. Only ran into a few people, but did stop to talk to a couple of young fellows with their fishing poles. We briefly discussed good spots and the joys of fising for stripers, before heading back to our cars. I’m back home now with visions of fishes dancing in my head. Believe me, should I catch a big old striper, you’ll all be the first to know.
