Penguin Plunge 2009
February 1, 2009 by Monika McGillicuddy
Filed under Blog, featured
I’ve lived in New Hampshire for many years and I’ve seen some pretty interesting things but I have never witnessed, first hand, a few hundred people in various state of undress jump into the ocean in the middle of winter!
Oh, I’ve seen it on TV but nothing prepares you for the level of excitement both in the crowds and amongst the “plungers” it was simply unreal.
Jay and I decided at the last minute to take a ride to the beach to see what we thought would be a hand full of NH Nuts plunging in the frigid ocean.
A fellow REALTOR was plunging and he had been talking about it on his Facebook page and I simply thought he was whacky! LOL! But I was intrigued enough to keep it in the back of my mind.
Sunday ended up being one of those rare days where the both of us were without any real estate appointments. So we went to the gym, we recently re-upped our membership, and then after a quick breakfast drove to Hampton beach.
Mistake # 1…thinking no one would be there but a few people watching. Reality was we couldn’t even find parking, at least not close to the event. It was hard to get close enough to see and we had to muscle our way through the crowd.
Mistake # 2 not wearing waterproof clothes. I did not expect to get wet! Not that I jumped in but many people got very wet just watching the event. My feet got wet but that was it for me.
This was a well planned event with vendors selling food and hot drinks. The whole beach was very much a contagious party atmosphere. I have never seen so many happy people in my life. 
Now I can add the Penguin Plunge to my list of must do events… No I’m not plunging but next year I’ll get there early and be prepared to get a bit wet.
All and all it was much fun in a weird NH way. Check out our complete Flickr photo stream of the event on our Flickr Page
We have a few videos posted and many photos of these special NH folks who feel so passionately of their cause, Special Olympics, that they risk jumping into 38 degree water temps.
I may call them “nuts” but really I admire them.
Nuts?? NH Nuts?
I’ve seen that plunge in person a couple of times – sounds like the ‘entertainment value’ has grown over time. When I went last, there weren’t too many people there, and certainly no food vendors.
OMG Ann..it was a mob scene. Not the size of the Sea Food festival by any stretch but parking was hard to get and getting near the water took some effort. I was unprepared for how popular the event was. Next year I’ll plan it much better! And yeah… they have to be nutty to jump in that frigid water!