The temperature of the sea water on Portugal’s Atlantic coast doesn’t encourage many to swim unless you’re into triathlons or some such and swim in a wetsuit. Often it’s a very quick in-and-out and a wrap in your towel. Got me thinking about my own experiences of swimming, in seas, in rivers, in lakes and in pools.
My early years were spent in Bath and by nine was a boarder in a school on the southern hills of the city. The obligatory weekly swimming lessons required a walk down to the small public swimming baths. Larking about one day, suddenly the challenge was to swim under the rather grotty wooden steps by which one entered the water. It probably required three strokes – I was not a confident swimmer and almost, almost got stuck. I can feel the wood of the steps against my back today!
Balcombe Lake lay in the valley below my parents’ house. During the summer school holidays I used to walk down across the fields to the water’s edge, strip off, and wade in. The bottom was thick mud and I didn’t dwell on what might be living in it, absorbed by the sense of freedom and being close to nature, the thrill of naked swimming. ‘Wild Swimming’ has become very popular in Britain in the last few years although sadly its attraction has highlighted another issue in the United Kingdom, the poor quality of the water in our rivers and streams, often as a result of ‘permitted run off’ from farms, both cattle and chicken.
During one Summer break from school Mr Proctor took a group of us to the Brecon Beacons in South Wales for some hill walking. We had some basic tents and blankets, sleeping bags being a luxury, and when not out on Pen y Fan or Cribyn were based in the Army’s hutted Sennybridge Camp. About a kilometre away lay the youthful River Usk, a cool, clear fast-flowing stream that eventually emptied into the Bristol Channel 120kms away. After a long day walking, it was heaven on earth to lower one’s body into the water and, hanging on to a boulder, let the stress of the day float away!
Dauntsey’s School had a long outdoor swimming pool built by the post-A Level students. It was fed by spring water, but a year after it was opened another project saw the water pumped into a large tank, from where it ran over some sun-heated corrugated panels; early solar heating I guess.
The first six weeks at The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst were designed to sort the ‘wheat from the chaff’, so to speak, with an accent on getting us physically fit. Part of that process was time spent in the large swimming pool. The eventual test was something like today’s: “Jump in and swim for 50 metres wearing a lifejacket. (Not in my time! More: “If you sink Mr Yates, Sir, an instructor will save you!”) Jump in with combat jacket and trousers, tread water for two minutes and then swim 20 metres.”
Almost without exception, when one swims one has a vague idea of how deep the water is; in a swimming pool it’s obvious, along a beach less so, but in the mid-Atlantic I knew the bottom was almost two thousand fathoms below my feet!
We imagined there were no shoals of fish here ….. so no sharks ….. but we kept a lookout and allowed only one person in at once. Very strange feeling, this during a transatlantic yacht race on a Nicholson 55 in 1976. (See PC 161 The Atlantic Sept 2019)
Have you ever thought to yourself: ‘God! I am a complete dickhead!’ or similar words? When I worked for Short Brothers’ Missile Systems Division my area of responsibility was ‘India and the Far East’ and on one trip in 1988 flew from Singapore to Brunei. I stayed in the capital Bandar Seri Begawan and gave a presentation at their Department of Defence. On the Saturday I drove out along the coast road to visit the Brunei Armed Forces’ Air Defence Battery, commanded by a friend of mine Andy Fellowes, seconded from the Royal Artillery.
Brunei lies due east of Malaysia
One particular stretch of the coast road ran parallel to the sea. On my return, it was a typical hot steamy late afternoon and I suddenly thought I could have a swim. There was virtually no traffic and certainly no visible humans, so I pulled off the road onto the sandy verge, locked the car and walked across the warm sand to the water’s edge. Toe in! Bliss! No one around and I thought just a quick swim, so stripped off my clothes and waded into the tropical water. Ah! After ten minutes of splashing around I thought I must get back, dry off somehow and return to my hotel. It was then I realised a little worrying undertow not only was taking me down the beach but also further out. I was only about ten metres from the shore but those ten metres were the longest in my life; major physical effort saw me back exhausted, lying on the sand thinking how stupid I had been. I sort-of saw the headlines in the newspaper: “Abandoned car and a pile of clothes! Mystery of the vanishing British sales executive.”
The river entrance is just north east of Aarosund
It was more of a hardship to jump into the fjord when sailing with chums in Denmark one year. We were in the south of the Little Belt and had sailed up the Haderslev Fjord to ensure a peaceful night at anchor in the river, only to find that the heads (WC to those of you unfamiliar with nautical nomenclature) was blocked. The only answer, it seemed, was to get over the side and reach under the water to the outlet pipe ….. and poke around until ….. it became unblocked! As the skipper, I didn’t ask for volunteers, just got on with it!
Richard 3rd November 2023
Hove
postcards 