Week 13 - Travel chaos and Ice cream
Weekly Review
NB Please scroll to the bottom for a selection of the photos taken
The great get away
It happens every year, the first weekend of the school holidays lead to grid lock in Dover. This year was worse than I have seen before.
I know that P&O have had their very public challenges, and then there’s Brexit and associated border changes, perhaps that’s why.
Or maybe it’s because of the lack of holidays in the last couple of years and everyone wanting to make the most of the school holidays this year.
Or could it be that with all the fiasco with cancelled flights and people wanted to take the ferry instead.
Who knows!
What I do know is that the roads were chaotic!
I knew that I couldn’t be the one who would be late to training so I left at 6am for a journey that should take 90 minutes, maybe another 20-30 due to the roadwork stretch.
It took me 3 hours!
I saw some lovely bits of countryside.
I drove past a long stretch of pebble beach that looked lovely for a swim.
And I made it to the beach at my normal time.
I felt for those who had been stuck in traffic the day before for 7 hours for what should have taken an hour.
Well done to the boys and girls in blue who worked so hard to unravel that logistical challenge.
Mandi had warned all the pods and those on the Facebook group of the challenges on Friday and advised people to bring water in case.
Clearly I’d be alright. As I pointed out in one of the pod WhatsApp groups, I had 10 litres of water, 10 litres of hot water, enough maltodextrin and UCAN to mix feeds for multiple Sarah Thomas worthy crossings and some tinned peaches. Dirk pointed out that I could only feed every hour, on the hour. That did make me chuckle!
I was expecting a few people to be stragglers due to the traffic, but was pleasantly surprised that the majority of people were on time.
I have no issue when events outside our control cause people to be delayed - cancelled trains, closed roads etc. What I don’t tolerate is when someone is late because they don’t think it’s important to be on time. Given that the vast majority of swimmers are easy to work with and follow our very simple rules, I won’t repeat all the reasons that it’s a problem for me when people are late (i.e. miss the briefing), just know that it is a problem. Well now I’m making it your problem, not mine. This is the final warning, next time expect to be refused access to training within the group.
Anyway, enough of the serious stuff.
The swimmers were magnificent.
What struck me about this weekend were the number of people who quietly came up to us and shared how they had overcome hurdles. There were lots of personal breakthroughs. To the outside world, these could be invisible.
What is a small achievement for one person could be a massive breakthrough for another. Thank you for the privilege for sharing with us. It’s one of the best elements of this job. We have the very big and public celebrations for the big swims, but in many ways it is these small breakthroughs that enable the big breakthroughs.
Thank you.
Keep being amazing.
Other amusing goings ons including Mandi enticing Peter through a tough patch with the promise of an ice cream at the feed. The look on Amanda’s face was a picture, so Amanda got (and shared) the first ice cream whilst I hot footed it to the ice cream van for another one for Peter!
Sunday was also a hot, hot, hot day and so at the 5 hour mark we gave a treat of Calippo ice lollies. They also seemed to be appreciated!
Shout outs
Training
Congratulations to:
Hannah for your 10 hour swim
Amanda, Helen, Peter and Paule for your back to back 7 & 6 swims
Brett, Tulasi & Paul for your 6 hour swims
Channel swimmer on the beach
Another week that saw success in multiple bodies of water, including:
Allan McPherson for your English Channel solo on 18th July in a time of 13hrs 21mins
Drew Fobbester for your Coniston swim on 23rd July
Sophie Smith for your successful Jersey to France solo in a time of 9hrs 9mins
Swim stats
Note: Water temperature taken during the swim session in the harbour. Air temperature, wind direction & wind speed taken from the Port of Dover app. Please remember that we get a lot of shelter in the harbour thanks to the walls.
Saturday:
Swimmers: 23
Water temperature: 20.1C
Air temperature: 18.9C
Conditions: F3 gusting F4 SW. Sunny. Calm to start, increasing breeze later
Sunday:
Swimmers: 25
Water temperature: 19.7C
Air temperature: 19C
Conditions: F4 gusting F5 SW. Sunny. Bit of chop at the ferry wall. Very hot on the beach!!
Volunteers & beach crew
Thank you to everyone who helped out this weekend - either a little or a lot. Mandi, you continue to be my rock and I am ever grateful. Kathryn also helped out this weekend and was fab. I’m a little disturbed by the colour coded feeding that Mandi & Kathryn got going, I’m not sure that I can live up to that standard!
The weather forecast meant that Keith was land bound and so we had the benefit of his company. Thank you for your help as ever, Keith.
What you may not realise is that with covid as it is, we are sanitising cups again between feeds. So thank you for those who helped with that process too.
Thank you to everyone who helped at feeds and with the arches.
If you want to join the fun, why not pick a date and join the fun on the beach!
The adventures of Dover Dave
Dover Dave continues to live his best life. After finishing his time with me he had the pleasure of spending time with Helen. It looks like he had a lot of fun!
Next week he’s being led astray, I mean hosted by Jane.
Paddlefish Ponderings - Growing tall
“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, ‘Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous?’
Actually, who are you not to be?
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
It’s not just in some of us; it’s in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
Every now and then, someone asks me why I give up every weekend to sit on a beach. I rarely get asked that question on the nice sunny days like we had this weekend, but far more often on the cold and wet days.
The answer is always the same.
And it’s nice to remind myself on those days when life is a bit difficult.
The reason is that I love to watch people grow.
We meet new people on the beach in May every year. We see the stages of competence (see previous ponderings) in action. Some people start nervously, having suddenly realised what they signed up for before they reached the beach. Some others turn up thinking it’ll be easy and quickly realise how much they didn’t already know.
Our job is to take you from where you are and get you ready for where you need to be.
We can do that, with your cooperation and support.
But it’s more than that.
We get front row seats on a journey of enlightenment, of self-growth, of finding out about things that you didn’t know about yourself.
We see those often nervous and apprehensive people turn up in May, slowly grow in stature, go off and achieve amazing things and come back a different person.
That transition has nothing to do with success. It has everything to do with learning about yourself. So, in many ways you have already been more successful than you realise before you even start your swim.
It’s beautiful to watch. An utter privilege.
On weekends like this one we get to see little glimpses in advance and we are grateful for you sharing these precious moments with us. We saw a lot of people walking tall this weekend.
Thank you for choosing to share your journey with us. Thank you for the confidence that you place in us.
These moments aren’t just in some people, they are in everyone.
What have your moments been?
Reminders
Remember to book your sessions online.
Bookings can be made up to 48 hours ahead and be cancelled or rescheduled up to 48 hours ahead also. The system doesn’t arrange automatic refunds, so if you would like a refund, please check out our refund policy and get in touch if you would like a refund.
If you miss this deadline then I’ll book you in if I have the available time and I have your disclaimer. There is an admin fee if you don’t use the self-service option.
Those of you with training subscriptions, enter your email address and click in the discount code box and your automatic voucher should appear. Let me know if you have any trouble with this.
Arrive on time
Wear the right colour hat - red for soloists, yellow for relay swimmers
Attend the mandatory safety briefing
Those of you who are members, please remember to cancel your membership when you no longer want it. You can do that within a membership period and still have all the benefits of it, this will prevent it from auto renewing next year. You can do this within your account, by following the link in the confirmation email when you took out your membership, or by asking me to do it for you.
Looking ahead
On Tour
Future On Tour dates:
Saturday 20th August
Saturday 17th September
The location will be either Ramsgate or Hythe and the location will be decided on the Thursday before the swim.
End of season celebration
It’s become a bit of a tradition that, rather than fade away as the season progresses that we get together for an end of season celebration on the last weekend of training. So mark the date in your calendar - Saturday 24th September - bring a picnic. We’ll bring inflatables!!
Spotlight in the shop
With all this sunny weather, a baseball cap is an ideal way to keep the worst of the sun off your head and face.
Photos
A few photos from the weekend….
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