Swim log · Zarasai
Eleven of us, one thermometer on a bootlace, and a lake that freezes every year.
A year-round swim log from the lakes around Zarasai: water temperatures, ice holes, thaw weeks, dawn crossings and the habits that get everyone out again.
- Coldest in the log
- 1.4°C Jan 2025
- Warmest in the log
- 21.4°C Jul 2024
- Entries kept
- 5written up Cards first, typed later
- Swimming here since
- 2020· Utena County, Lithuania
The log, plotted
Every entry sits where the water sat when it was written. Readings come off a glass thermometer at knee depth, held under for a minute, in whichever bay we were standing in that morning.
- Jun2026Kit and habitsSix things in the bag, and the habits that matter moreThe short list of kit that earns its place through a Lithuanian winter, the gear that does not, and the counting habits that matter more than any of it.18.3 °C · 6 min read
- Nov2025Water temperatureBelow ten degrees: the thermometer, the clock, the afterdropThe one reading that sets the whole winter plan, why a minute per degree is only a ceiling, and the twenty minutes on the bank that decide the morning.5.1 °C · 8 min read
- Jan2025WinterCutting an ice hole that is still open on Sunday morningWhere to cut and where not to, how to push the slab under instead of lifting it out, keeping a hole open at minus fifteen, and planning the exit first.1.4 °C · 8 min read
- Jul2024SummerDawn swims in July, and why we are in before sixThe flat hour before the wind gets up, a lake that layers warm over cold, boats on the crossing line, and the carelessness that warm water brings.21.4 °C · 6 min read
- Mar2024SpringThe thaw fortnight: swimming a lake that is coming apartTwo or three weeks when the ice is neither safe nor gone, the water runs colder than it did in January, and the entry has to be chosen twice.2.6 °C · 7 min read
The swimming year
What the water does between one winter and the next
Four years of bank-side readings, averaged by month. The pale columns are the months when we dip rather than swim, and the whole left-hand half of the year is why the log exists at all.
Ice is usually walkable from the second week of January to the middle of March. The coldest water of the year arrives after it, in the thaw.
- 1.4J
- 0.8F
- 2.6M
- 7.2A
- 13.1M
- 18.3J
- 21.4J
- 20.5A
- 15.2S
- 9.6O
- 5.1N
- 2.7D
On the bank
Four things nobody argues about
Eleven of us swim in the lakes around Zarasai all year, and I keep the log: water readings, ice conditions, how long anybody stayed in, and the habits we built after the mornings that went badly.
- 01Nobody gets in the water alone, in any season.
- 02Measure the water. The air will lie to you.
- 03Plan the way out before anybody undresses.
- 04Write the reading down before the sauna, not after.
Last written up