Everybody deserves a good paddling on their birthday

Today I turned 44. Which is probably the reason I was left out of the 20-under-40-movers-and-shakers-around-town list today.
That, and the fact that I don’t move or shake so good no more.

Anyway, I sent both kids off to school this morning then loaded up the kayak to treat myself to a quick paddle on the lake.

Disregarding the fecal coliform warning sign, I put in at Lake Place Plaza, or Corner of the Lake Park, and went to about 21st Ave E. It was a hazy day, one of those days where the horizon disappears and the water and the sky appear to be the same thing. Which as you head into it, leads you to believe you could be flying, or drowning. The water was really still, so I could see stuff on the bottom pretty well. I saw:

car springs (2 different sets in 2 places)

A huge fireworks rocket, probably 2-3 feet long

lots of old timbers and support structures, including pieces of that crib that washed down the shore a few years ago

huge squares of cement, between 4 and 8 feet across and a foot or 2 thick

someone with a guitar sleeping in a tent made of a plastic sheet (not underwater … on the shore at about 12th Ave, hidden from the Lakewalk etc.)

a tennis ball

a handrail

several pipes and tubes, but the most interesting was at about 15th Ave. There was a big pipe, probably 3 feet across, and it had rods running along both sides of it. At each joint or junction between sections was what looked like a rubber seal or something, and some sort of mechanism attaching the rods to the junction. It went waaay out into the lake, I followed it out until the water got too deep to see it anymore. Here’s a crappy drawing of what I remember it looking like.

Anybody know what that might be? I think I heard the water supply comes from East of Lester River.