Brighton, Tuesday 29th March, 6pm

At last a March sea swim for SW...

After a terribly long winded cold combined with the sort of travelling and commuting that leaves me no longer knowing if I am coming or going I almost went the whole month of March without a salty dip.

Last weeks Portuguese pool had got me warmed up so to speak and this evening the sun is just about shining and I am only blowing my nose every half an hour - time for some bravery. Resurrecting my run and swim combo I packed a rucksack with my towel and goggles and set off for Hove.

After 5 k I thought I would be hot enough so ran down to the empty beach. Calm but grey and very fishy smelling. Not exactly tempting! Oh well, just keep remembering last chance in March...

adopting the traditional cormorant position..

Having left my boots and gloves in Dorset it was also going to be my first sea swim of the year without them. I had forgotten how difficult it is to walk on cold shingle and keep your dignity. I think I only managed the former but luckily I mainly had sea gulls for company. The water was fine. Not bad at all on the feet but a bit burny on the hands when swimming - guess I need to toughen them up after a few months of neoprene luxury. Lots of floaty bit and scum patches (do you think I could get a job with VisitBrighton?) but I managed to not swallow anything and had a lovely swim, like MG enjoying the ability to venture a bit further out.

There was enough sun for a calm change on the beach and a leisurely walk up the hill - my last walk up hill to our old house as we are moving next week - to a new flat even nearer the sea, just one street away, so I will have no excuses at least for when in Hove.

Marvao, Portugal

Another in occasional series of tempting foreign pools...

Marvao, in mountains of eastern Portugal, by the Spanish border. Beautiful, isolated, empty and still a bit cold, despite southerly latitude.

My first question when we arrived at our accommodation was of course about the pool. Unfortunately it was closed for winter but the owners said I could try it out if I did not mind a lot of leaves and algae and 7 degrees. 7 degrees! pah!

The following morning, first thing, I felt honour bound to try it out. I was soon regretting my bravado. Having to walk down slimy steps was a bit torturous - no shingle shelf or large wave to 'help' you in and take away any natural caution/indecision/cowardice. 

Once in and dodging the leaves however it was fine. I think it was nearer 10 degrees as it barely burnt even without gloves or boots. And the sweeping views across to Spain were as breathtaking as the temperature. Length turns were entertaining as the walls were too covered in slimy algae to push off from but it did make it feel a more natural experience. 

Knowing a hot shower and cup of tea were about 20 steps away allowed me to stay in until I was properly cold, free from fear of pesky Dorset winds to chill you down while chasing 7 layers of clothing across the beach...

Burton Bradstock. Sunday 27th March, 3pm

MG

I had hoped to have a special entry from my Sunday audience, FHH, but instead she has sent the awesome picture story you see above. The words to accompany it will be brief. Since it is now taking SW and I approx one week to log our swims, the end of the blog may be nigh, which is as it should be; the end of this years Winter Swimming Season is definitely nigh. Although saying that, I had my first swim last year on the 12^th April and barely made it through alive, so all things are relative.

It was a grey hazy day, but hot enough that I was determined to swim and dragged the visiting FHH down to the beach. Conditions were far from perfect with a crowded beach (as we walked over the sand bank it was SO hot that I half expected to see SOMEONE ELSE IN THE WATER… but not yet, phew) and churning waves from a still sea, which I think must be caused by unusually high tides at the moment. Again, the shelf was alarmingly steep and coming out I was practically clambering up a vertical bank a few feet in. However I unwillingly changed, stumbled in and struck out towards France, leaving my audience dog watching and anxiously chroniciling. I hadn't been feeling it at all, and my first few strokes were fairly unpleasant through grey water with a strong unattractive smell. But a bit further out, the water cleared and through the heat haze I could see the yellowy cliffs while the crowds of gaping onlookers were only a blur, which is how I like it. I was able to go much further than for a while which is brilliant, and shades of things to come in just a few more weeks as Spring really hits (our favourite slogan of the summer months is "we're definitely level with the end of the pier now" which is a claim always refuted by our audience, even tho we ARE).

As I came ashore, FHH approached and did some paddling – rather pleasingly, she described the burning agony into which this plunged her untrained feet, leaving her even fuller of admiration for my uncomplaining bravery and fortitude. But to me, compared to what we have been through this winter, being able to lie on the beach in a damp swimming costume without 15 cashmere jumpers, a flask of hot chocolate or an attack of uncontrollable hyperthermia inspired giggles, does not feel particularly brave. But it does feel lovely.

Sunday 20th March: Snettisham, Norfolk 19:00 High Tide 8.3m

After three hours sleep a hangover and eight hours at work my enthusiasm for a moonlit night swim has significantly wained. Yes I know the huge super moon was actually Saturday night but I thought it would still be pretty spectacular one day later. Cycling to work at dawn on Sunday morning the sky was streaked blood red and I should have remembered the old saying but surely the warning only applied to shepherds not swimmers? I've spent at least the last week telling everyone I know that I want to do this so when it gets to the point and  I want to just go and hide under the duvet SHAME will stop me. This is very good tactic for most things in life. By the time the minute hand hits a quarter past six in the evening however I want to to cry, consider txting M.G. but know she will just repeat our mantra "it's always worth it" or tell me this whole thing is supposed to be enjoyable not torture and I don't have to do it.I know that it's pretty early in the evening but doubt that my willpower will last until later.

 The lone lifeguard is being so very supportive instead of offering up the usual dire warnings of impending death or ways I could potentially injure myself that I begin to think the huge moon has affected his mind.  I'm unsure of the Night swim etiquette and it only occurs to me after a huge Indian meal that eating masses before swimming is possibly a bad idea. Clearly I'm just going to sink to the bottom of The Wash like a curry flavoured stone. As we drive to the coast the sky is looking suspiciously cloudy, I start to think that maybe I should have actually looked up what time the moon rises...

The Car park at Snettisham is mercifully empty which improves my mood no end until I walk over the sea wall and see a line of guys fishing off the high tide. Honestly is there never any time when the beach is empty?

 I entrust the lone lifeguard with camera duties who unlike me is not completely incompetent and has remembered a torch so is really more of a walking lighthouse. Stripping off I can't say it's any colder than usual actually it's quite a balmy night probably because of all the CLOUD. Despite the lack of moon it is still very beautiful I can see flickering lights of boats out to sea, the rather brighter lights of Sunny Hunny further up the coast and even a faint glow from across the other side of the Wash. The sea is calm but black and the Stone age part of my brain puts up a brief protest against entering dark murky waters underneath which anything could lurk. Thankfully though any sea beasties will be hauled in by the battery of fishermen 20ft away. 

The tide is so high my feet are still on the shingle when it becomes deep enough to swim. I push out and look back to shore gradually all the light is fading fast and the dark figures become dark shadows on the shore. Weirdly although I'm about as much in the open as anyone can be I feel strangely enclosed. In the day the sea stretches to the horizon and I feel like just a little part in this vast expanse, but with less light you swim along in a patch  of water that just stretches a few meters around you. I don't think you would have this sensation on a moonlit night although I can see that would be amazing in a completely different way. As I get out I realise the lifeguard's torch has stopped working the lifeguard also isn't sure whether the camera is on the right setting and potentially we have no pictures. I am on such a high however that even this blogging failure can't bring me down. The lifeguard goes off to apologise to the fishermen for me scaring the fish away while I struggle into my many layers. This is another tick in the plus column for night swimming as false modesty can go out the window as you don't have to worry about flashing delicate minded beach walkers. I am so pleased I did this and think that Night swimming is definitely something I am going to do more of from now on. 

Once home I discover at least one picture thankfully in which I am sort for visible although M.G. has already suggested that I'm masquerading as the loch ness monster.

J.J.

Fishy....

JJ

Garra Rufa fish nibbling...

Burton Bradstock 2.00 Thursday 17th March

MG

I'm hankering after a Dartmoor swim – Cullever Steps, or Spitchwick Common, or the mythical, cosmic Glaze Brook where the universe may implode if I dare dip, but after some debate, PJ (famous for her startling fortitude at the Sharrah Pool, see 11th October 2010) makes the trip eastwards from Exeter, deciding that there is plenty of time ahead for the Dartmoor rivers when the water is a little less, shall we say, refreshing.

So it is we make our slow way to Burton on this glorious, perfect, truly springing day. "This is the weather the cuckoo likes, and so do I" and all that jazz. Despite urgings by self and, surprisingly, by the non-support support team (who gets more supportive by the day; in this case even helpfully pressing swimming costumes on the unwilling PJ) I'm a lone shark again and change and saunter, pausing only to accept PJ's admiration of my boots. Today even my first steps in are joyous as ahead of me in the wave break I can see that FINALLY the water is clear, gin clear, right down to the sandy bottom. This is the thing I have been most looking forward to, and I fall in and surge ahead with only a song in my heart.

It's amazing, I'd say the best swim of the year, but each in their own way is the best. This though feels different in the same way that the late October and November swims felt different; the seasons are changing and the water with them. I can swim without any agony, only two dips and each long and lingering, and I could easily stay in longer and swim further. What an absolute JOY it is to have this privilege, rising and falling with the slight swell, and gazing onward at the shadow of the Golden Cap in the unfaltering sunshine.

Knowing we have tea outside ahead of us, I don't go under and so miss out on the nerve tingling brain freeze I so love – but this does enable me to avoid any chill at all, as I leisurely chat and change into a motley collection of post-swimwear, which causes PJ to wince. And then – perfect conclusion, several enormous slices of cake over which we wonder, does breakfast, lunch and tea count as a triathlon?

West Bay 14th March, 5.00

MG

Too rough to swim alone (and that's actually NOT an excuse, it really was; waves coming in sideways) so the Mascot and I walk and talk instead.

Hopefully get another swim later in the week..... How cold are the rivers? Too cold?

Snettisham, Norfolk, Sunday 13th March 11.15am

J.J.

At last my first sea swim of 2011. I feel extremely shamefaced that it has taken so long it's March for goodness sake! Starting a two month  late New Year resolution to not be so lazy I cycle 8 miles to meet my support team for the morning. Hoping that the exercise will nullify my reluctance to plunge the murky depths and armed with the essential flask of tea and some cinnamon buns we set off for the coast.
The sky turns to that ominous bruised grey which threatens with the promise of rain as we make our way past the endless sad looking caravan parks to Snettisham beach.There is always a bleak melancholy around holiday resorts in the winter season so by the time we reach the car park my resolve is wavering.
Horribly self conscious we make our way down to the shore, I pull myself together as for one it isn't snowing so it really can't be that bad even with a mass audience of dog walkers. Not a very big tide today only about 5.5m so a little bit of wading will be required, I'm soon standing shivering in my costume pulling on the very essential gloves and giving directions on how to work my rubbish point and shoot camera. I am very proud to say even after a months break since the pond swim in January that I can still wade in calmly and strike out with no exclamations or screaming. Clearly as I haven't been swimming  at least four times a week I'm not acclimatised so I can say with confidence that it is definitely warmer than December the 27th. I'm not thrashing about in a futile attempt to stop my arms and legs seizing up but actually swimming! I manage to swim parallel with shore and back again and decide to get out wading through the shallows my feet sinking into the mud in that kind of disgusting but slightly satisfying way. My support team hands me the towel which  I am able to grasp with both hands and I stand feeling lovely and warm as the sun breaks through the cloud. Basking in the sun I decide to go in for another dip, even after the support team has voiced doubts about whether my legs are supposed to be that colour of scarlet. It feels lovely with sun on the water an actual sign stronger than snowdrops and daffs that spring has arrived after so many false starts. I finally get out as I feel the chill creeping up my legs. I mange to dress slowly and not in the mad dash that normally follows a winter dip. Still incredibly grateful for hot sweet tea post swim. Cycling home next to the River Ouse on an incredible high, just so happy to have been in the sea.

 This evening as I was watching more of the footage from the tsunami in Japan I was left with an overwhelming feeling of being so small and powerless in the face of such immense force and destruction. It seemed completely unreal to have spent the morning floating in such calm sea waters.

Burton Bradstock Sunday 13th March 5.00pm

MG

SW is house bound by a cold which is probably more annoying for him than for me on this glorious day, so I won't go on about it. I'm slightly over swimming by myself (there's no one to laugh at my jokes or pour the cocoa) but as the day steadily improves until by tea time there's barely a cloud in the sky, I know I'll regret it if I don't. So I descend from the hill top where I've been walking the Mascot and the Hairy Aunt, and put in an appearance at Burton. I've been so anxious to miss the Sunday crowds that I've actually left it a bit late, and am just hopefully wondering if it isn't too cold, when the sun breaks clear of the only cloud in the sky and everything is cast with it's rosey balm. I give myself a pep talk ("it's going to be fine, everything's going to be fine") struggle out of my clothes and advance. The water is much clearer than it's been for a while, but I must say it does feel cold, not helped by my practically falling in as the bottom drops away after three steps. But the feeling of the warm sun on my face as I strike out is unbeatable, and looking back at the empty beach, and up at the blue sky – it's worth it without a doubt. This is a good one.

I'm in for ages on my third dip, and force myself in when going underwater causes a fairly spectacular brain freeze. As I change a knowledgeable family approaches on the horizon "have you been going in all year?... yes, I thought you must have been". I feel proud and reflective as I think back on the year (I'll save my reflections for SW) and gaze rather dreamily at them. They clearly think I'm insane, particularly when the woman asks me if I do triathalons, which though extremely gratifying, will inspire hilarity in anyone who knows me… (lazybones).

I jump in the car and motor home singing along to The Beatles "I'd like to be, under the sea, in an octupus's garden in the shade….". Yes, I would.

Ps I'm thinking it's almost time for KH to put in an appearance. KH?? You know you want to…

Kenwood Ladies Pond, Monday 7th March 12.00

MG

I'm still on a soaring high from our holiday, and to calm my jangling nerves and fight off the onset of a crippling depression brought about by the return to real life, I make the pilgrimage to Hampstead. It's a perfect day for it – clear blue skies, and London actually looking quite beautiful; it's a very clever city at sudden surprises, reminding you that maybe it isn't all traffic, and Oxford Circus, and filing, and tourists getting in your way and never seeing the sky… look hard enough and you might find this…

I meander across the Heath, for once getting neither lost nor furious as I make my slow way to the ponds. There they are, still, glassy, green, but appetising all the same. There's a lady just getting out, and another arrives as I leave, so there is clearly a steady flow even at what must be the slowest part of the morning. We have some banter, and again, there's that brilliant feeling of shared understanding between winter swimmers; we're mad to everyone else, but to each other, it's the best sort of sanity.

I approach the water and agonise as I slither down the ladder and in; it's 6 degrees –  exactly the same as when I came in January, which seems surprisingly constant. It's cold. But the birds are singing and the sun is warm on my face as I strike out across the water. I'm in too long I think, doing several rounds (I must be careful about this) – I only get out when my hands start to tingle and a strange spasm like a tentacle shoots across my arm. Of course, it may actually be a tentacle….

I change leisurely and a lady arrives and is in and out before I'm even in my third layer tshirt. She is totally breathless as she comes back in, glowing, but gasping, which I remember from my first swim last year (April – when I nearly died and SW and I looked like we had been peeled after two minutes in the water), but haven't experienced for ages. I gaze reminiscently and slightly nostalgically at her struggle for air as her lungs look like they are about to close up. What happy days those were.

Despite easy breathing, I'm cold and dash across the Heath to Kenwood for several cups of recombobulating tea and bowls of stew. Our holiday and all it's various treats may be over, but for a good few weeks more at least, the icy, life giving water is going nowhere. As SW reassuringly says as I later lament the approach of warmer waters (!! That's a joke… sort of…) "I think we can shiver at any temperature if we stay in long enough and dive deep enough".

Criccieth - North Wales, or How to Lose your Head in Wales, 5th March 7.45 am

MG

Put an obsessive wild swimmer in charge of a holiday and you will probably find that all roads lead somewhere watery. Thus it was that ECP and I set out on our merry (some might say too merry) way, roadtripping around the Northerly coastal corner of Wales, swimming costume, fleecy tracksuit bottoms and wetsuit boots securely packed. Wales is awash with swimming spots – the Wye at Hay, famous for almost washing me away while my lifeguard read poetry under a tree; the expanse of Whitesands near St David's where JJ and I were the only ones wetsuit-less a few years ago. I've been dying to swim in the tarns over Snowdon for years, but even I will concede that they may not be at their best in March. But after last week's success, I'm buoyed up and determined to take the plunge somewhere.

But it isn't till day three that a perfect opportunity arises. Well, that's sort of true. It isn't till day three that an opportunity SO perfect that I can't ignore it and claim that the water is too shallow, too rough, too dangerous for me to swim alone… It's not that I don't want to, but as previously discussed, an icy plunge isn't always exactly what one feels like...

Criccieth was already highlighted in gold for me by it's description in the guide book; "when Victorian sea bathing became fashionable, English families descended on the sweeping sand and shingle beach at Criccieth…". Yes please. Without any especial effort I have managed to book us into a B&B literally 50 yards from the sea, which almost causes me to spontaneously combust with over excitement. I send SW a few exhilaratory texts, and go to sleep knowing that a pre-breakfast swim is in the offing, which triggers a lovely dream in which I am a seagull, perched on the Battenberg cliffs of Westbay. It is hard to shake this off as, luxury of luxuries, I can hear the sea and the other seagulls from my bed as I awake. I wish every morning started like this. In daylight we've got the most fantastic look out on the flat calm water stretching away and the sun blearily shining.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I do some prancing, but at least it's confined to our room, ECP eventually pushing me out with a "are you going or not?!". The spectre of HL and her fearless swim before breakfast in Brighton last week makes it totally impossible for me to bail; if she were here we would have had sixteen swims already, and she probably would have swum to Dublin and back. So I prance down the stairs and out to the car to grab my towel, then gallop down to the beach. ECP is watching for the "not waving but drowning" signal from our bedroom window, and gives me the thumbs up as I assume an air of nonchanclence, change and swagger down. And then – joy of joys, I'm swimming.

I do a few bursts, work through the burn, and by my last stretch, as always, I feel I could stay in for hours. It's indescribable. With Criccieth castle to my left, the mountains of Snowdonia vaguely visible ahead, and the glassy sea and misty sky blurring into each other, this is what Roger Deakin describes as Dream Swimming, suspended in time and space. It's peerless, perfection, stillness, peace and bliss.

After eventually dragging myself out, changing (and accepting congratulations from a passing dog walker) I make the mistake of wading in to rinse out my swimming costume and without my boots, the burn in my toes is alarming, which shows how essential the boots are. The feeling is starting to flood back with a vengeance, and by the time I'm back in our room I'm feeling a bit chilled, to say the least – soon sorted by a hot shower (oh for one of these on the beach! SW?!) and followed by an enormous swimmer's breakfast.

"Was it you in the sea?" asks our landlady "My husband said some nutter had gone in the water…". She follows up this cracker with stories of leatherback turtles and dolphins in the bay, and most excitingly, a killer whale which had been biting the heads off the seals last summer. I'm relieved to be able to leave Criccieth not only having gone down in legend as A Nutter, but also with my head held high, and, still attached.