Polar Bear Plunge – New Year’s Day 2026, Coney Island NYC

In the company of my friend and fellow 35mmc conspirator Scott Ferguson, I returned to Coney Island on January 1 for the 123rd Annual New Year’s Day Polar Bear Plunge. Scott brought along two Leica M3s, an eminently sensible camera choice considering the gusting winds and frigid temperatures—a high of 28 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 2 degrees Celsius). I had initially thought of bringing a 4×5 view camera…bellows, dark cloth and all…which would have been madness! As it was Scott wasn’t obliged to change films nearly as frequently as I was with my two TLRs, a Tele-Rolleiflex 135mm f4 and a Rolleiflex 2.8F/Planar, and their cursed twelve-exposure rolls. I avoided frostbite or dropping cameras and film rolls in the surf, a minor miracle given the temperatures and my all-season clumsiness.

Despite the cold, the folks who made the plunge were incongruously cheerful as they courted hypothermia, spurred on by the encouragement of volunteers with megaphones who urged them in shrill tones to “go deeper!” or (my favorite) “duck your heads under!” Reluctant to wade into an unheated pool in August, I was not even remotely tempted to join this mid-winter ritual; for me, it is the stuff of which nightmares are made.

The visual possibilities of the day were self-evident, however, a fact which explains the large number of photographers among the crowd. It felt at times like the ratio of picture-snappers to plungers exceeded 1:1, and the proportion of film cameras, for those inclined to notice such things, was striking (though perhaps it shouldn’t have been: Coney Island is part of Brooklyn, an epicenter of the film resurgence in the United States).

Technically the day brought some challenges, among them the lighting—the sun was blazing in over the waves, silouhetting the swimmers—and, of course, there was the cold, which meant that the plungers and everyone else was in a hurry, making thoughtful composition on a TLR a bit of a challenge. In choosing two fixed lens square-format cameras, neither equipped with a wide-angle lens, I also stacked the deck in favor of contextual portraiture of individuals or small groups rather than larger tableaux of the beach and surroundings.

Was I successful in capturing the anarchic energy of the day, or the sense of accomplishment among the participants as they strode out of the waves to dry off, painfully shivering or giddy depending on the individual? I don’t know…in my hands at least, every shot out of a Rolleiflex tends to look like a studio portrait. (Whether this is built into the square format or reflects of my own limited imagination remains to be seen). Yet I am sure I will have a better sense when I see Scott’s photos—to be shared here in a companion piece (I’ve had a peek and they look marvelous)—and which will hopefully provide a different angle, literally, metaphorically, on the event and on these first stirrings of 2026, now roaring to life.

Thanks so much for reading.

Featured Image: Master of Ceremonies, 2026. Rolleiflex 2.8F, Kodak Tri-X 400.

You can see more of my photos at www.leica1933.com.

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