WIS News 10 - Columbia, South Carolina | Man rowing from Cleveland to Key West for charity

Man rowing from Cleveland to Key West for charity

By Drew Stewart - bio | email

SUMMERTON, SC (WIS) - He's rowing a boat from Cleveland to Key West. He came into Charleston harbor, and is spending some time in Clarendon County. That's where we caught up with Tom Kotula, who explained why he's taking a trip one stroke at a time.

It's not the easiest way to travel the east coast, but taking the easy way isn't necessarily how Tom Kotula tends to approach life. Just let him tell you about living on an old boat for nine months.

"There are good days where the water is like glass and you're just gliding along, then some bad days like on Lake Erie," Kotula said.
    
Kotula converted an old sail boat, got a leave of absence from his engineering job, and is rowing down the east coast, stopping in cities along the way and volunteering for Habitat for Humanity.

"I wanted to combine the rowing, my desire to travel and volunteer and combine them all together in one big trip," said Kotula.

Volunteerism has been a way of life for Tom, even as he grew up in Cleveland.

"I've done other types of work like this before with my family," said Kotula. "We made trips to Appalachia. It's just been something I've grown up around."

Even as the Habitat site in Manning was shut down, Tom just couldn't be idle.

"I didn't want to sit along at all, so I did some painting at the old Scout House in Summerton," he said.
   
Tom's brother-in-law helped him row through Charleston harbor, and people outside the family have been just as neighborly.

"That's been the story along the whole route, a great surprise and truly a blessing are all the people, just perfect strangers who've pulled into the dock, and just asked me what they could do to help me," said Kotula.

Kotula is helping others, one city and one stroke at a time.

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