A Dip In The Lake

I love camping, the great outdoors, being under the stars, falling asleep listening to the noises in the valley or being awakened in the middle of the night by them. This is often entertaining because people forget that a tent is not a house and that everything they say and do inside can be heard by other folk nearby. L sleeps through this nocturnal entertainment and she’s gutted to have missed it when I tell her in the morning.

It’s gloriously hot today, which is odd, this being the Lake District, where the rain is usually wetter and more persistent than the rubbish we get in the Midlands. It’s a great day to be out on the fells or even to swim across Windermere, which is what L is doing today. Although not until 2:30 in the afternoon, so we have a leisurely morning and discover to our delight that the campsite has its own breakfast van. Very welcome.

Then we head over to the swim. There is no parking at the event but there is an option to ‘park and sail’, a variation on ‘park and ride’, but I’m not too sure how the dogs would cope with that. It is also based on the South side of Ambleside at Bowness, so is of little use to us stationed to the north. So we park and walk from Ambleside to the event’s start and finishing point at the Low Wood Hotel.

We get there in time to see the two elite races where British swimmer Tom Allen takes bronze in an eye watering time of 16:26 and GB junior Katy Whitfield takes silver in 18:15.

Double Olympic champion Rebecca Adlington is present to help start the races but doesn’t get her feet wet unlike the GB team mate she beat in Beijing, Jo Jackson, who competed in the elite race and finished eighth.



Then it’s time for L to don her wetsuit in readiness for her dip in England’s largest lake. Apparently 6,000 participants, in waves of around 200 a time, will swim the one-mile loop within the lake today and tomorrow. To add to the pressure elite swimmers Olympic 10k Silver medallist, Keri-Anne Payne, fourth in the women’s and Ross Davenport fifth in the men’s opt to go again in L’s wave, swimming with their friends and family.

There’s also the self-styled nutter, sorry adventurer, Sky Sports journalist Julian Crabtree who is swimming in every wave of all four Great Swim events across the UK. With the waves going off every half-an-hour, he can’t afford to take his time.

There are many celebrities participating and also to his credit the Health Secretary Andy Burnham, a minister practising what he preaches for once. L is more worried about Irish runner Sonia O'Sullivan, who she’s raced against before, on foot, and got slaughtered obviously. I’ve no idea how good Sonia is at swimming.

It might be hot today but the water temperature is a chilly 16.3C. Despite this some participants opt to brave it in standard swim suits and one or two of them don’t make it all the way and are pulled out by the rescue boats.

L does 43 minutes which is very impressive, comfortably mid-table, and she didn’t have to cling to any of the boats, like I would have done. Some swimmers took over 80 minutes. Ross Davenport comes in ahead of L but she beats Keri-Anne Payne, who no disrespect to L’s fabulous achievement must have been taking it considerably easier than in the elite race when she clocked just over 18 minutes.



Afterwards we retire to a local watering hole for a pint and a sandwich, and then back to the campsite for more of the same. The beer is better tonight; we track down the Old Peculiar although it has to watered down with Cumberland Ale for the sake of tomorrows hangover.

We meet a couple who are looking to move from their terrific Langdale Valley bolt hole and move to Uttoxeter to be near their Grandchildren. L and I both look incredulous. They were nice enough to offer us their house, if we can raise the £550,000. Yeah right.