[Paddlewise] E. coli: do you paddle in it?

I paddle about 100 days a year in the DesPlaines River in Illinois.  
Somewhat high E. coli count every day and more so in the winter when 
treatment facilities are allowed to release higher levels of it.

I've been paddling a hundred days or more in this river since 1978 when I 
started training in slalom gates.  Even in dead flat water, slalom training 
results in a lot of splashing.  By the end of any workout I am soaked.  I 
would guess I've ingested a whole lot of sewage in my life.

I have, twice, rolled in the river.  After a big rain I surf at a small dam 
and really get soaked and get faceful splashes on most moves.  I also raced 
for many years at Indiana's South Bend slalom course, where the organizers 
sometimes gave us written notice that the fecal coliform was so high that 
the law required us to be told.

The last time I had a cold was early 1996.  I never get sick.  An 
acquaintence who was a sewer worker for the city of Chicago once told me, 
sincerely I think, that sewer workers' immune systems are rock solid from 
all the exposure to germs over time.  Sort of like Lucretia Borgia building 
up a resistance to arsenic.

Of course, I DO glow in the dark......

Jim Tibensky


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