The Aquadettes Synchronized Swim Team, California, 1996

Members of the Aquadettes, a synchronized swimming team at Leisure World Retirement Community in Laguna Hills, California, practice their formations. Activities like line dancing, lawn bowling, and computer classes make such retirement communities increasingly popular among people with decades of free time to fill. "Anyone who's bored here is a stick in the mud," says Aquadette Barbara Hack.

(Text adapted from and photo shot on assignment for, but not published in, "Aging—New Answers to Old Questions," November 1997, National Geographic magazine)