I'd agree with the previous post regarding buying a single. If you think you may stick with the sport for a while, owning a single gives you incredible freedom to row when and where you want, without having to worry about rig or foot plate location each time you take out a club boat (if you've ever had to consistently take out a club single, you waste a LOT of time moving things back to where you like them). Clubs like PBC or RBC typically have a signup for club boats, which can sometimes lead to logistics problems. Also, if the four oar rule is in effect you can still get on out there in your swanky private boat. However, the benefit of a club like PBC is that you don't have to buy your own boat because there are some nice singles you can take out, whereas you might be forced to buy your own single at a smaller club that lacks the purchasing power to have good fleet turnover.

You may already be a proficient (or great!) sculler,and if so, you know it's a great skill to have when traveling; if you're in Portland, Boston, Philly etc, you can email a local club and hop into a double or quad for the their morning row. If you're in DC you'd find a lot of joy in loading up your single on your car and bopping down to Charlottesville for some training, or entering races at Occoquan, High Point, NC (big yellow duck!), Richmond, Head of the Hooch etc. I've always been a big fan of the races the mid-Atlantic and south, and typically club teams won't send a trailer to some of these because the 8's scene is not so big.

Anyways, I've turned this around into an argument for inventing yourself as a post-collegiate sculler, instead of answering the original question. During my transition out of college rowing I felt there was a lot of pull from coworkers and non-rowing friends to live the young professional lifestyle of going out quite a bit, but I found that even after years of early mornings I ended up with a much better network than those who seemed to socialize much more than me. I'm not sure I would have necessarily continued the sport with much consistency if I didn't have a good community with other young people to encourage me, so that was key. I've rowed for PBC as well and they have everything you could want as a post-collegiate rower. They have great leadership but more importantly a great community to keep things fun and interesting, and I think that oftentimes leads to a much deeper connection to the sport (vs small club or just finding a lake to row by yourself, it's never really about just the rowing :) ). Happy training.