Miles To Go.

Janet Lee; nine ball machine

I once beat Janet Lee, the famous black widow, at nine ball in a giant exhibition. * **

While you’ll have to read to the bottom for the whole truth, let me at least  explain partially: it was excellent training for starting and growing  companies. Really. Here is what I used over the next 20 years from what I learned in  that one game:

The crowd is mostly noise: forget about them. So many startups  compete in crowded fields, with others releasing news and versions day after  day. While it’s good to be in tune, an entrepreneur has to be about supreme  focus on the task at hand. Nothing else matters.

The break sets it all up- that’s the team and launch. The entire DNA  of the table emerges with the first big shot- the break. Same goes for the  launch in entrepreneurs. Get it right and give it your all. Otherwise, the table  is a mess and takes more effort to clean up.

Know the speed of the table- market. Nothing ruins a well  executed shot than a misread of the felt. Rollers become bouncers, or never  make it to the pocket. You have to know how fast a surface you are playing on,  in either game.

Miracle shots also come with consequences. It’s amazing how  many wild triple bank shots present themselves in any nine ball game. But they  are low percentage shots. Worse still, they may leave your opponent an easy angle to finish you off, then and there. Calculate the odds, both of the shot,  and of the consequences.

Momentum is real. Make a bank shot, a lefty and a combo and you begin to feel you are invincible. You see the table with possibility, and your stroke has a confidence that could achieve anything. It feeds on itself, and it is certainly picked up by your opponent.

Think ahead: making the 3 ball does not mean you are in position for the 4. Ah, yes, the essence of nine ball is actually the next shot. Players and entrepreneurs both have to look down the table at what could be, and how their next move positions them.

Don’t think ahead too much: getting a good leave for the 4 ball only counts if you sink the 3 ball. And the reverse corollary to the rule above is: think longer term, but don[t forget to execute on the little things right before you. Otherwise, there will be no next shot.

Nothing counts as much as the last ball: run eight in a row and scratch and you lose anyways. Funny how people can stroke smoothly and confidently on 1-8 and suddenly look twice at an easy 9 ball shot. Miss and the opponent suddenly has you over a barrel in a way uncommon to the previous 8 shots. For entrepreneurs, this might be analogous to the exit: blow that and  it’s a re-rack, plus probably a waste of several of your best years.

Be a creative problem solver: there are more than one ways  to sink the shot. My game really improved when I began playing on several  levels, mostly to include banks, combos and the occasional jumper shot. But  basically, this is looking at a set of circumstances (the balls and their table  position) and figuring out the best shot for your abilities and for the odds of  leaving nothing good for your opponent. I also shoot left and righty (which  most people don’t know and makes me good money on side bets). And the  last comment is likely safe because pool players don’t read many blogs!

Don’t confuse luck and skill. I had a little of the latter, and for a moment a ton of the former. In any case, don’t stay too long at any table. Knowing when to walk is a life saver.

Shake hands and be a gentleman, win or lose. Perhaps most  importantly, the handshake acknowledges that you won or lost fair and square,  and were a sportsman throughout. This plays equally in nine ball and  entrepreneurship. Get used to it; you are going to lose a few. Handle yourself  with dignity and learn a few lessons for the next game.

*And now, the technicalities: Janet Lee was hosting the Brunswick table at  the Chicago Housewares show at McCormick Center, in the mid 90′s which is a large exhibition  hall (ok, everyone else was there for blenders and hooks!). The fact I was walking the floor looking for companies (and  eventually found a deal I did there) should not get in the way of a good story. I have lots of bizarre analogies, this is but one.

**She challenged me to ONE GAME and sank a  ball on the break. She sank two more before trying a two-banker, perhaps  playing to the crowd. In my finest nine ball moment, I sank the next six  including the 9 ball for the win. She has gone on to tremendous success as a  touring pro, and wants to learn about digital media. Knowing the odds were long  I ever would beat her in any rack again as long as I lived, I retired from  competitive nine ball that afternoon and used the lessons for angel investing  and creating businesses.

Join me in liking Janet Lee on Facebook and Twitter and thanking her for all she has done for  start-ups!

Huana AKA Sugar loaf

I was in Deer Valley recently for a Pelion LP meeting and the topic turned to high- altitude climbing. Entrepreneurs that I work with know that I constantly use the experience as an analogly for building companies. (I have analogies for everything, some more crazy than others.  At least, that’s what I’m told).

The basic premise is that, as you get to higher  altitudes, your mind and body play tricks on you. Cognitive powers are altered. Moving carefully and deliberately is important, but so is having a guide to help you move quicker and avoid mis-steps. For a look into real-world mountain climbs, there’s a great book called Into Thin Air by Krakuer that covers it well. (and the rebuttal by Anatoly Bukareev is just as good). As for entrepreneurship, there are very few books about a company’s pending danger and death; most focus on reaching the top. I wrote a bit about that aspect in a prior post called Let ‘em Crash. I personally have been to what I define as” high altitude,” both in climbing and entrepreneurship. (Over 10,000 and over $100M+ in valuation, respectively.) Here’s a hairy story from one climb: entrepreneurs, see if you can pick out the analogie(s).

A trip to Peru brought me to the Machu Picchu lodge and my altitude adjustment was fully set, having begun the trip in Cusco at 11,000 feet. I had climbed Huana Picchu earlier that day, at dawn. I saw the most spectacular sunrise, as many Inca priests had before me (hint, these would be VC’s), and marveled at the symmetry of the Sun Gate and the other temples in the complex. I returned to the lodge for late breakfast. It was there we began talking about Cerro, the peak I had seen obscured by mist from Huana, with a giant flag fluttering at the top. I did some quick calculations and decided I could make it by sundown.

Cerro is the highest immediate peak above Macchu Pichu, but there’s nothing technical about it.  Like most of the Inca trail, .ost of the path is carved rock.  A little slippery at times, and occasionally requiring pull-ups, but mostly the climb is a mental one. I say this because the Urabumba River roars on three sides of the peak, and the drop is about 1,000m, sometimes straight.  After a few thousand feet, the mist socked me in. All there was in front of me were stones, laid by Incas many hundreds of years ago, and vines. And the sound of the river. It became my navigation.  As I heard it down and to my left, I knew I was on the west face; at it switched to my right, I knew I the path had traversed to the west. Half way up, I met two Japanese who were on descent. You alone?, they asked. Yup. Even that small exchange heartened me, not for the guidance, but for the fact someone else would know where I was on the mountain if things got bad. As it was, their estimate was a bit off.

 Ninety minutes later, I came through a skree field of snakestone (awesome green stuff that looks like malachite, but softer) and arrived at a gate of carved rock. It was the first clue I was entering a holy place. From there, I experienced my closest-to-divine moment. The path became flat, and the mist enveloped my feet, such that only my footfall revealed the path in front of me. I was on the spine of the peak, so the sun, or what was left of it, made the way brighter. I noticed orchids, which grow wild at that altitude. And hummingbirds which fluttered around like some  Natural History Museum display. Summit euphoria was taking over, as I heard the flag flapping in the wind in front of me. As I reached it I sat still for twenty minutes, precious time given the daylight. It was total peace. (Have you guessed? This is an exit!) 

When I turned to go, I notice the river roaring about me not on my left or right, but on three sides. With the dimming sun, the mist, the flowers and birds it was truly heaven. The euphoria lasts through the first fifteen minutes of descent, as I passed markings I had made in my mind during the ascent. I allowed myself to gain momentum, feeling free, and frankly as good as a teenager in springtime. Then I mis-stepped. In an instant, I was hurtling down one side of the face, when I instinctively grabbed on of the vines hanging from the face. It caught me, and I quickly recovered, with not a small amount of briars — and a pulse suddenly 2x. I kept rolling, and reached the main Inca village by dusk.

Llamas get around without Merrils

At dinner that night back in Macchu Pichu, one of our guides, Juan —- asked if I had walked or crawled on the spine of Cerro. I told him, and he was surprised. Most people crawl, he said. The spine is only 2m wide, and the drop to the river there is about 800m on the right side, and 1,200m (4,000 feet) on the left. Well, I walked the whole thing… maybe leaning a bit to the right to compensate for the difference…

But the most interesting thing about that climb was what it taught me about the entrepreneurial climb: the height of the ascent is an optional objective… but the return is mandatory!

» Monastario-Cusco
» Machu Pichu Lodge
 and ask for  Juan and Lourdes Sotomayor

Compo Beach Volley. The serve was in...

Beach volleyball taught me something very valuable in angel investing: how to guess.

I’ve been playing since the mid-90′s, when I discovered an open court in Aruba and fell in with an old Choate pal, Nick Webb, who ran Connecticut’s largest tourneys at Sherwood Island. For those not familiar, beach volleyball is a game of two-on-two, played on a regulation sand court. The balls are served and slammed at incredible velocity, and the reaction times are akin to those of a  baseball player at bat. There’s nowhere to hide, and only one partner to save you. Many volleys take a Herculean effort to keep alive; no wonder most beach volley players end up in pretty good shape.

One great example is defensing a good hitter. My partner would generally block, meaning he would be up in the air roughly covering one-fourth of the court, and unable to further adjust. This left the remaining 650 square feet of sand to me, an entirely indefensible area when the ball is coming at you at 120 mph. And even if you are in the right spot, you have to have your hands in the right place to even have a prayer of digging the ball.

Sounds hopeless, right?

But as the years roll by, one thing emerges that saves you : how to read the subtleties of the game and use them to Guess Well.

In beach volleyball, there are a ton of subtle hints that inform your guess while defensing a slam: how tired is this guy? What did he do to win the point last time? Does he look up (and see me) before he jumps? Does his partner scan the court and tip him off? Is he young and prone to swinging as hard as he can, or is he wily and likely to try some slop shot?  How high does he jump and at what angle can he hit the ball down? Was my partner able to block him earlier? Was his approach clean or not? How close to the net is the set? Would this slam be the game winner?

Answer these questions instantaneously and you can make a pretty informed guess as to which few square feet the ball is heading into and at what speed and arc. Arrive there in time to dig the smash and you look like a magic lightning-cat capable of tracking down anything on the court. Dig a few in a row this way, and you really have an advantage.

Likewise, there are a ton of reads in backing successful entrepreneurs- none of which I am going to give away today. Most of them are imperceptible to the untrained eye. But they are huge clues to making good guesses, and if you can read them well, you can cover a lot of court.

Editors note: The Compo Beach volleyball courts still among the best in Southern Connecticut.  Come by and see what real beach volleyball means- at least on the East Coast. (We know the gods live and play in Los Angeles and Rio).

Coordinates
» Compo Beach, Westport, CT

RollFast WingDing: One sweet ride

I learned a few things about entrepreneurship from my buddy Dave Buckenheimer and my RollFast Wing bike — but bear with me first: this is a hell of a wipeout story. Let’s start with our Moms.  Both were from the laissez faire school of child rearing, as in… break your arm falling on the swing? Get bit by the bunny in the pet center out back? Burn yourself making a funeral pyre for some unlucky ants? All fine, just be home for dinner. It’s amazing how much we learned by simply breaking, bleeding, and wailing our way through our play-filled youth. Bike wrecks were the highest form of this adolescent art form and Gailey Boulevard, a steep switchback that ran from our house down into town, was our particular proving ground. It was also where Dave lived.  One afternoon,  I called and let Bucky know I was headed his way;  he said he’d meet me at the bottom. I hopped on my trusty Wing Ding Rollfast and hit Gailey full steam.

The Wing Ding was my go-to bike. I liked its simplicity. It had only one speed: fast. And it could brake really well, allowing me to execute perfect fishtail skids. Gailey had no traffic whatsoever, making it a relatively safe ride. The only wildcard in the equation was pig iron, a waste byproduct of the steel mills downriver in Pittsburgh. Sometime, somewhere, someone saw fit to cover Gailey with this metallic stuff, vaguely reminiscent of blown glass beads, Generally smooth to the touch, some of it was sharp as a blade if cracked. This would become meaningful very shortly.

I was halfway down Gailey by now, although the Wing Ding was nowhere near top speed, mainly because the loose pig iron made me plenty careful in the hairpin turns. Trees zipped by, I passed the last of the four homes and picked up speed after the last of the hairpins. I was running flat out when I saw Bucky near the base of the Boulevard. He had a weird look on his face: a dropping jaw and the beginnings of a slow motion scream worthy of a Bruce Lee death sequence. He was pointing at something.  My feet locked into the pedals of the Wing Ding, my hands on the padded handlebars my brother had been working on lately. Garage Note: when a gooseneck handlebar is loosened to do custom work, you still have handlebars that can make a variety of turns no problem. But if you lift the bars straight up, they slip right out. Not an issue when you are working in the garage; definitely an issue when you are flying down Gailey Boulevard.

I actually thought I had a shot at pulling out of it. The handlebars were now high in my hands, separated from the steering column by at least a foot. But the wheel hadn’t turned at all and I was coasting below top speed. If the wheel stayed straight, another 20 feet and I could bail with minimal damage. Bucky was rooting for me to pull off one of the great saves in Beaver, PA Biking History.

That fleeting hope was done in by a loose piece of pig iron redirecting my tire. That was all she wrote. The wheel lurched to a 90* angle that I was powerless to correct. I was ass-over-tea cups, still holding the handlebars, still clueless as how I got that way. My brother knew, however — he’d been working a chopper conversion for an upcoming Evil Knievel jump off the Spencer swimming pool, and neglected to mention the job was only half done.

Gailey Boulevard met me with all the hospitality one would expect of loose asphalt and scrap pig iron greeting an 8 year-old in shorts, a t-shirt and packing a lot of velocity.

According to Bucky, it was the most spectacular wipeout ever. I missed it:  my head hit next and I was out. Bucky picked me up and helped me to his house. When I came to, his sister Amy was using a tongue depressor to remove a piece of pig iron the size of a quarter from my knee. I passed out again.  We still practiced baseball that afternoon and when it got near dark, Mrs. B  gave me and the mangled Wing Ding a ride home.

Here’s what a mangled –but exhilarated — 8 year old can teach entrepreneurs:

1. Go full out on something you love.
2. Fail once in a while. It won’t kill you.
3. Get the h*ll back up and do something else, and let the scars remind you a bit.

Unlike a lot of kids today who are practically wrapped in bubble-wrap, we grew up active participants in life, with an amazing sense of adventure. That carries on today, informing my entrepreneur experience.  I only wish more kids- and entrepreneurs — would behave with the same abandon. Most of what I observe in today’s kids is an awful lot of video consumption and precious little actual contact with anything else.  If that continues unchecked, Video Thumb will become will be our main body part in 10,000 years. If anyone reading this is still around then, remember, you read it here first.

KFAC X features Maori island images... sorta.

I was sitting on my porch, listening to the water gurgle peacefully in the pool as it does when I don’t change the filter right proper. I tried to figure out how a fifty dollar bet could end up, years later, launching a small armada of kayaks and a charitable phenomenon. And that’s when I put two and two together.

Kayak for a Cause, the Foundation I founded with Scott Carlin, has been pretty well documented in the press- thank you very much Greg Matusky. But one story that hasn’t been written is this: things happen when they are ready to happen. While I prefer my destiny in my hands, crossing Long Island Sound in a kayak definitely puts that destiny somewhere else. How you deal with it makes all the difference I believe.

KFAC III and KFAC IV illustrate my point.

KFAC III was a death march on water. We put 8 boats in the water. It took most of us 6+ plus hours in withering heat. Some finished in 7+. Some did not finish. Most of us needed transfusions in Long Island. My arm was mummified from the elbow to the thumb, a condition that looks as idiotic as it sounds. (I pulled too hard with the right to compensate for an uneven paddle stroke). We retuned to Connecticut, mumbled a few goodbyes, and headed for home. And half of the paddlers did not- would not- do it again.

KFAC IV was different, you might say. We put 40 kayaks in the water. I personally knocked four hours off my time, and I was basically the middle of an amazing pack that ranged from 2:00 to 3:10 total time. We stuck together, we had a nice reception in Long Island, and we posed for pictures for the media. When we got back to Norwalk, we were treated to a lobster dinner on the beach and the luscious sounds of a diva named MORLEY and her band. We raised over $70,000, about 700% over the prior year. We thought that was a lot.

Since then we have put 1,5000 butts in kayaks and lead them across Long Island Sound. We’ve raised over $1,000,000 for charities tha support our community, environment and leasdership. We have an all volunteer organization of ~50 people to produce the event. And we have a blast doing it.

So, what gives?

Truthfully, it was just the tide, doing its thing both literally and figuratively. Before we hit the water, we caught some good swells. A committed volunteer organization* rallied around us and created our look, vetted charities, recruited paddlers, sourced kayaks and chase boats, arranged land transport, found entertainment, and managed donations. We let it happen, I’m proud to say, by answering most every challenge with simply this; let it take you. We were able to deal with near disasters like being short 15 kayaks at 05:00 and logistical challenges like returning 40 kayaks by land when they had arrived by sea. To match the swell of support on land, we let the currents take us at sea: we enjoyed 3 knots tides, both out of Norwalk and into Northport, with a 5mph tail wind to boot. It was fun.

Where will the tide of KFAC take us next? One thing’s for sure, we’ll stick to the spirit and fun of that $50 bet. And we’ll let the tides take us from there.

Sharks are cool. Really

I’ve gone nuts for oxygen! It was a gradual attraction, I’ll admit. We have been to so many wonderful places in the world, and I haven’t have the proper training to get underwater it seemed like a waste. When I was booked to the Galapagos last fall, I was determined no to miss that one.

A word about training: do it. I was trained by some of the best, Capt. Saam right here I Stamford, CT runs a sick three Saturdays NAUI class that had me off and running. Don Lapore kicked my butt all over the Weeki Watchi Springs (they filmed Sea Hunt there- it was like coming home to my western PA sit-com roots) and I was ready for the Galapagos, or so I thought.

For those that have not been, I can’t say enough about a Galapagos trip. Start with the fact that Darwin thought up Darwinism there. Adapt or die. Be strong or die. Be lucky or die. And eventually, if you are all those things, grow old and die. And you win!

I kicked off the back of the Scuba Iguana boat my first time at Cousins Rock. Bam!100 tuna in my face, swimming like they were late for work. Reason soon to follow: 50 hammerhead sharks right behind them. I felt like I was on the track at the Indy 500 of finned fish! We sank like stones (not quite, I don’t equalize well) and we at ~30M pretty quick. We come around a corner and? what’s this? guys from national geographic that my dive partner hadn’t seen in 6 months. So they strike up a conversation, at 30M under cousins rock, about their latest project with seahorses. And there are tow of them now! I was so overwhelmed I consumed 2,800 psi within a half hour, which is an embarrassing rookie performance. But I was a rookie, in the Galapagos, with the greatest collection of mammals, fish, currents, and friends one could imagine.

The trip just keep getting better after that. We night dived in Academy bay, hit Gordons Rock, Cousins again, Floreana, and then Gordons. All the while I felt I was in the most serious, capable hands of Richard and Pepo and the crew from Iguana. Diving is serious stuff, and the Galapagos is doubly so. If you are lucky enough to go, be prepared. And be prepared to have a blast.

If you go
» Scuba Iguana- just the best
» Galapagos Hotel- adjacent, and awesome
» Zarapata Caf?-La Panga- food, lave rocs, and Jack Johnson, best pool players in the pacific. Bring your wallet!

 I keep meeting good people.

The world is full of them, though they are often hidden behind what governments project in order to well, govern, and what their armies do when they do what they do, and what we easily label them when we are too lazy to meet them person to person. Word did not like that run-on sentence, but I’m sticking with it.

A recent trip to Germany for a few World Cup Matches drove home the point I’m making here. I had funny feelings about Germans all my life. My Grandfather’s war stories were filled with invective and hatred. And he was entitled to it, having been shot off his feet in a trench in St. Mihiel in 1918. The fact that he later married one (well, and Austrian but who’s counting) did not back him down one bit. If you sat down with Grandpa, you would get one of three stories, and they all ended up with damn Germans?. My father’s fascination with the movie Where Eagles Dare was the source of most of our boyhood history on the Second War. It had something for everyone: respect for authorities (Dad), grand theatrics (brother), Clint Eastwood (mom and my sisters). And it ended up with, of course, Allies outsmarting Germans. We watched it every time it came on, no matter what hour. We weren’t told, but we were somehow taught: we were free because of the two wars we had won against these people. And that’s all I knew for many years.

But the Germany I saw in June of 2006 was very different. And the Germans themselves I found charming. I think the first healthy thing I observed was that they now look at their history as one that is 1,600 years old. The National Museum makes that point clear. The Knights Teuton, Frederick the Great, and Westphalia are featured prominently. The two wars are as well, but so is the triumph of the Fall of the Wall and Communism right behind it. It’s a rich and long past, and Germans time and again said to me yes, that happened. All of it. I was not part of it, but it is part of me. Now, let’s move forward?.

And so they are rebuilding their city (again), learning how to do business in a global economy, and asking question after question about how to do things better, faster, cheaper. To a person, they each revered and respected America and Americans. Their gratitude for rebuilding their country after the war and helping it escape communism was palpable. And so World Cup was their first world party they would be hosting, re-united. Logistically, it was a masterpiece of German organization. But again, it was the people that stood out; in two instances for me. The first was the flag waving: remember, this is a new unified flag. And they got in a lot of trouble for big parades and banners in the late 30?s and 40?s. So, honestly, they first waved sheepishly and as if they would be shut down any moment. But as the Cup wore on and Germany moved on, the pride welled again and the flag was waved high, often, and in huge crowds. Over 1,500,000 gathered in Brandenburg park to watch the semi on TV screens. (Germany lost in the 88th minute).

Which is when the second instance of German distinction appeared: rather than pout as a nation about their loss, they rallied in their role as hosts and did not let the loss by their team ruin the party. It was one of the great ?chins up? moments of the year for me, and an entire nation, led by their defeated team pulled off one of the classiest moves I’ve ever seen.

Germany is more than two horrible wars, more than the bad guys in one great movie, more than a semi-final loss to Italia. The people have an old school class I won’t soon forget. Now the mix of architecture… I’m not so sure!

Swimming is getting more important in the work-out mashup that is a middle-age athletic life. I used to love the pool as a kid, spending most every day in the summer playing all kinds of ridiculous games with my siblings and neighborhood friends. “Minnow” and “Marco Polo” come quickly to mind, the latter being an example of how much a little sister can get away with cheating and still never catch an older brother who lived underwater.

But now, swimming has become a great low impact workout that nevertheless burns a tremendous amount of energy. I am not the first one to figure this out, but I may be uniquely qualified to opine upon some world bests, having been to many round the globe more than a few times, and always hitting the pool where I land as part of “who needs sleep” regimen. A word on the judging before we begin. Pools are for swimming, so they have to excel there first. I grew up swimming in the Beaver public pool (packed minnow scene) and later our own in ground in the backyard, so I begin with hopelessly low standards, but that’s before travelling the world. Now my book includes scenic integration, and some scenery worth integrating. Overcrowding (more than 2 people) is instant DSQ in my book. Needless accompaniments like hovering pool staff, warm towels, branded robes and overpriced lotion will not count for extra, but will not be deducted as long as they do not interfere.

Ready? One two three jump!!!

Rating a mention is the pool at Hotel de Paris in Monte Carlo, mainly for the view. Great giant kidney nestled into the cliffs, but too much indoor and too much spa traffic for my tastes. The Miraflores Club in Lima has an amazing over-hanger, but no-one swims as the weather is always mist. The Fairmont in Chicago has a stunner as well, but it is shared with a club next door, so I don’t really know who owns it so scratch that one. Riyadh has a beauty in the Al Faisaliya Hotel, if you are ever in town hanging around waiting for Princes to call. Full Olympic job, with hand applied tiles throughout, an unbelievable waterfall, super heating and cooling systems, great extras like the ice-death plunge pool and no-one is ever there! Total swimmers paradise, except that-get this- you can’t ever see the sun (uh, one hang-up of Islam). Despite this, I give it my runner up status. It’s that good. Winner goes to a place on the French Riviera- Alps Maritimes, actually. Mortgage your house, drain the kid’s retirement fund and/or max the credit cards for a fun week at Eden Roc in Cap D’Antibes. Jewel in the crown of a family hotel operator (that owns Brenner’s in Baden Baden and the Bristol in Paris), the place was bought sight unseen (ok, seen from the boat) by the big man, who insisted it remain a family operation and not succumb to Omni-Mega-World Domination Hotel Corp. So far, so good!

The pool is worth it all. Perched on a 30-acre nature preserve, Eden Roc is the “summer cottage” portion of Hotel du Cap, made famous firstly by F. Scott Fitzgerald and later all sorts of fashion and movie stars. Cannes and its festival are just across the bay in late May. And the pool itself is pure masterpiece. Cut into the rocks and facing west, it’s a negative edge job that’s falls into the best western view there is. It’s a salt water job, so you literally fly and float (just don’t drink, and keep the goggles tight). Most people are there to be seen, so the pool is like I-95 at 3:00am, pure fast-lane.

But it keeps going (yes, the aforementioned towels, robes, lotion and service are always available) but check out the gymnastic equipment strung out over the water. What a great place to horse around and break an arm! And if that’s not enough for you, some very legitimate 5 and 10 meter boards to plunge into the colder than it looks Med. Nice thing about the derring-do equipment: there are no peligroso signs on them. Anyone idiot enough to try should not be permitted to bring any action against the owners lest they be laughed out of court. The swim platforms are out there, a-ways off, if you can fight off the hypothermia to get to them. I now know why sea lions warm themselves on the rocks between dips! Unlike them, I was permitted to return to the pool (+/-85f) feels all the better. (No, the Med doesn’t have sea lions- try Galapagos). But the Galapagos doesn’t have an Eden Roc either! Francois, Pierre, Jean-Jacques my congratulations. As pool boys, you work at the center of the world.