So long, and thanks for all the fish

It was huge in every sense.

Huge fun. A huge effort from everyone involved. Huge support for the fundraising effort. And a huge swim.

After a month of above average temperatures and flat seas, I guess it was time for a bit of a change. The forecasts in the week leading up to the swim had started off scary but then seemed to steadily improve. Perhaps a hint of confidence - over confidence? - started to creep into the equation.

Based on the training swims, I'd even secretly started hoping that I might get near to the magic 3 hr mark for the swim. Definitely a stretch target and requiring a faster pace than I would normally swim for a 2km swim in the pool, let alone a 10km swim in the open seas.

But nervousness and reality came flooding back at about 7.24pm on  Friday evening when, at the pre-race briefing, the swim organisers casually mentioned that:

1. the coast guard's forecasts for the weekend were for 2-3 metre swells from the South, with 20 knot winds; and
2. the swim was in fact a bit over 11km rather than 10km.

Egad!

So here's how it played out, stroke by stroke:

Saturday 2pm: Carbo loading begins in earnest.

Saturday 4pm: Stomach butterflies take up residence.

Saturday 5-8pm: pre-race warm-up at Paddington Bowls for a friend's birthday (Happy Birthday, Jo!). Stuck to lemon squash. Lack of beer did not improve my lawn bowling.

Saturday 11pm: early to bed. Stomach buttterflies seem to be holding a quidditch tournament.

Sunday 4.44am: wake up. Relatively impressed that I've slept this long. Stomach butterflies now holding a  smash-up derby. Going over gear lists (what I need for beach, for kayak, for end of race etc) in my head puts me out again.

Sunday 7am: Wow! I slept in! This is it.

Sunday 7.30am: Homemade muesli, banana + coffee, the breakfast of champions (or, at least, the breakfast of people who make up the numbers in these events).

8.20am: arrive at Bondi Beach. It's sunny, but 12 degrees, wind blowing from the South, there's a pretty decent swell and some waves rolling in, some of them biggish. Oh, and a sign just where the start line will be saying "Dangerous Currents". So why do I look so very pleased?

8.30am: my well-wishers are out in full force. They look as nervous as I feel!

8.50am: strip down to speedos. Brrr. Apply vaseline under arms and back of neck. Head down onto sand, ready for the start. A bunch of people are applying what looks like creamed honey all over their torsos. Shark repellent? Additional flotation? Insulation? Who knows?

8.59am: this really is it. Nowhere to go but out to sea.

Mostly it's blokes who are silly enough to do this sort of thing, but there were a few ladies too

9.00am: off we go!

9.03am: swimming along nicely, I get through the break. Or at least, I think I've got through the break, when all of a sudden - wham! - I'm swamped by a big wave I didn't see coming and half lose my goggles. Stop. Tread water. Tighten goggles. Tighten them a little too much in fact, so that by the end of the race, with my yellow cap on, I look a bit like this:

9.04am: underway again with goggles in place, when I see a sea snake! Or at least it looks like a sea snake, and it's attached to the legs of one of the other swimmers! We're not even out of Bondi bay, and already the wildlife is attacking us. No, hang on. It's an electronic shark repeller. Is it too late to go back and get one of those? Maybe I should just swim next to this bloke the whole way.

9.10am: reach the first checkpoint which is one of two dozen white boats bobbing about off Ben Buckler (the headland at the north end of Bondi), where each swimmer is supposed to check in and get matched up with his/her support boat, before heading off up the coast. There are 50+ solo swimmers and about 40 teams entered in this event, meaning there are close to 100 boats bobbing around and about 50 people on kayaks too. The sun's in our eyes. The surf's up. This is not so easy.

The flotilla as viewed from North Bondi

Fortunately, Fred "The Lynx" Linker - my kayaker, lifeline and guide for the day - has worn a distinctive red cap and I manage to spot him. Great! Now we really are underway, and we thread our way through all the other boats/kayaks.

Turning around Ben Buckler, squinting into the sun, it's cliffs, cliffs, cliffs, as far as I can see going up the coast. Our isolation is stark.

Cliffs, cliffs, cliffs

I decide to use North Head as a landmark for navigation. Hopefully I'll remember to turn left before we get there.

9.25am: getting into a decent rhythm now. Everything's feeling pretty good. Fred's close by keeping an eye on me, and Doug and Vaughan in the support boat are shadowing us about 50m away. The water temperature is great too - about 20C. Far warmer than it was standing on the beach.

I'm swimming about 200-300 metres offshore. Not too close to the cliffs ,where the waves breaking on the cliffs reflect back and create a whole lot of rough water. But not too far out either. From the distant silhouettes of some other boats, it looks like some people are trying to circumnavigate New Zealand on their way up the coast.

As we move up the coast line, we can track our progress against the landmarks up on the cliffs. First up is the chimney from the Nth Bondi sewage treatment works. Nice.

9.50am: Fred signals that it's time to have a snack. The plan is to eat and drink something every hour or so. So I stop and tread water, hanging on to the side of the kayak. Fred hands me an energy gel - tropical flavour. Haven't tried this one before, but find it tastes equally as bad as raspberry when mixed with a mouthful of seawater.

Looking at the GPS, it seems we've already covered about 4km in the first 50mins! That's an unheard of pace for me. The GPS was probably being somewhat optimistic, but it was clear we had the current pushing us along too. Happy days! Let's keep going.

10.20am: As a friend said to me, "just keep swimming".

10.40am: Still making good progress. We're continuing to pass landmarks up on the cliffs.

At one point Fred motions to me to look up, and there, just discernible as human-shaped figures on the top of the cliff are my family and some friends who've decided to walk the cliff tops tracking my progress. They'll follow me all the way up to South Head and then around to Watsons Bay.

After giving them the thumbs up, I put my head down and... just keep swimming.

11.05am: What's that I can see in the distance? It's a little red and white lighthouse! Why is that exciting? Because that lighthouse is on the very tip of South Head. It marks the entrance to the harbour and the beginning of the final stretch of the swim.

Almost immediately, things start to get bumpy. There's a lot of chop coming out of the harbour, coming off the cliffs to my left, and somehow also coming in from the open sea. The wind has picked up too.

My normal freestyle stroke has me breathing bilaterally. But no matter which side I'm breathing on, I'm getting as much water in my mouth as air.

The rough water also seems to be slowing me down. But I'm getting closer to the lighthouse. Just keep swimming.

11.10am - 11.35am: I can still see that bloody lighthouse! Enough already! Because I'm pivoting around it as I come around and into the Harbour, the lighthouse is constantly on my left. Intellectually I know I'm making forward progress, but the combination of the rough water, wind and that bloody lighthouse makes it feel like I'm going nowhere.

He'll be coming 'round the lighthouse when comes, he'll be coming 'round the lighthouse....  

11.40am: Can't see the lighthouse anymore! Hooray! It's still very choppy though. I was sure once we were in the Harbour proper, it would smooth out considerably. Not so.

Lady Bay Beach is on my left. This is meant to be a sheltered part of the Harbour, but not today. Just keep swimming.

In the distance, I can see the city skyline.

11.45am: I'm passing Camp Cove - the last little bay before Watsons Bay. I'm now very close to shore, maybe only 20m out. There, on the headland, is my entire family. My kids are jumping up and down, Alina, her parents  my parents and my aunt and uncle visiting from NZ are all waving. They're all calling out. I stop and give them a double thumbs up. I'm almost overcome with emotion. After nearly 3 hours in the water, the end is so close now.

Team Glaucoma, rounding the tip of Camp Cove. 600m from the finish line. Manly ferry in the distance

Entering Watsons Bay is like falling into an icy bath. Really. The water has been a balmy 20C ever since Bondi Beach, and I haven't felt cold at all. All of a sudden, from one stroke to the next, the temperature drops at least 3 degrees. Swim faster!

11.55am: Swimming through the moored boats in Watsons Bay now. There's a turning buoy I need to go around before heading in to shore.

11.56am: I can see the finish line, which is the wooden boat ramp at Vaucluse Yacht Club. The pier all around it is full of people. I can hear them yelling. They're yelling for me!

Vaughan and Doug are right behind me in the boat. Fred's right next to me. They've had my back the whole way.

Now Fred's yelling - "100m to go!"

"C'mon Daniel. 50m to go!"

"25m to go! Keep swimming"

11.58am: the Finish Line!!!

I touch the bottom of the boat ramp. People are yelling, clapping, cheering. There's a race official right there who says something to me, which I completely can't hear.

The boat ramp is wooden and very slippery. I haul my torso up onto it, slip and roll onto my side. I kneel, then stand up, slipping some more. Everyone's still cheering. I can see my kids standing at the top of the ramp clapping and jumping around.

I stagger up the boat ramp to the race officals' table where they write something down.

Now everyone's hugging me. Now I'm completely overwhelmed.

It's done. I'm done.

Here's the finish on video:

Geoff Pollard, National Executive Officer of Glaucoma Australia was there to greet me. Through the swim, we had raised over $12,500 $13,000! What a fantastic result.

With Geoff Pollard, NEO of Glaucoma Australia. Note my goggle eyes!

Wow! Managed to do it in under 3 hours. I had been hoping to get close to 3 hours, but never really thought I could beat it, even if only by a couple of minutes. The South swell definitely helped.

Here's the GPS trace of our route. Thanks to the team, you can see we steered a superbly straight course the whole way, with no time-wasting deviations in to shore or out to sea.

After a few minutes, I find my fabulous team: Doug, Vaughan and Fred. I can't thank them enough.

Vaughan, me, Fred and Doug

So a huge thanks to everyone involved in making this swim and fundraising exercise such a success:

• my brilliant support team, pictured above, who gave up their time and suffered through the cold, to look after me;
• my absolutely amazing wife - Alina - and my kids, who put up with me talking about nothing but swimming for 3 months, and spending a huge amount of time at the pool or the beach training;
• my wonderful extended family and friends, many of whom came along to the start and/or finish of the race, and who tweeted, facebooked etc details of my efforts to spread the word;
• my friends at Addisons, for all their encouragement and interest;
• all my varied training partners, whether on foot, on bike or in the water, and especially Robbo "The Salmon" Salamon who enjoyed the training swims so much he entered and completed the swim himself - great stuff!;
• Sophie from Ozpaddle who made the kayak available and made the logistics of it easy for us;
• Paul Ellercamp from Oceanswims.com for helping to publicise this effort;
• Geoff Pollard of Glaucoma Australia for publicising the swim and looking after all the fundraising admin;
• John Fallon and the other volunteers who organise the South Head Roughwater, putting on a spectacular event; and
• last but not least, everyone who supported the effort with words of encouragement, interest and donations to Glaucoma Australia.

Thank you all, from the bottom of my heart.

That's all from me. I'd like to end with the traditional oceanswimming farewell song:

PS - please remember to get your eyes tested regularly for Glaucoma, particularly if you are over 50 or have a family history of Glaucoma. Don't let the "sneak thief of sight" rob you!