Charity Swim 2026

Various injuries and ailments have meant that we haven’t done any crazy challenges in the last few years. That changed however, this week!

So…the original plan was to swim the 3 rivers of Cornwall in one day. We’d utilise the tide for some assistance and complete around 38km. However, planned date 1 saw howling easterly winds and planned date 2 saw us swim from Gweek, down the Helford River to Durgan. The conditions though, turned in the afternoon and an un-forecasted westerly wind kicked up and stopped us from completing swim 2. We then didn’t have enough daylight to safely attempt the challenge again this year! So that a load of training (on Gavin’s part…not so much mine!), we decided to make up the distance by swimming around St Michael’s Mount 14 times. Approx 24km unassisted by the tide! We avoided the ferry channel for obvious reasons, so did something like the following…

I’ll cover my swims, as Gavin’s been training for the channel and did the whole thing in his trunks no problems.

From what I remember…as we did a few laps…

LAP 1 & 2 : I had a slightly painful head. Thought it was the goggles digging into the bridge of my nose, as they often do but putting on an emergency extra cap, I was absolutely fine…so problem solved. I did also tow my GoPro with a floatable handle but it kept knocking into my ankles and I could feel the slight drag, so it didn’t last long before I ditched it.

We did swim past a couple on a SUP with their dog. Which isn’t actually that unusual here!

LAP 3 & 4 : Very similar to lap 1 & 2 but two massive black helicopters "‘buzzed the St Michael’s Mount tower’ (for any Top Gun fans out there). They were only 25m above head.

LAP 5 & 6 : Local lifeguard on a jetski came out and chatted to us, as we’d left our rescue board and supplies strapped to a lobster pot buoy and the harbour master was kicking off (concerned)!

I wore a shorty wetsuit, that’s around 2mm in the arms. As I currently have limited fat reserves and we were swimming at a slow to moderate pace, I started to get cold. The wetsuit is great up to 3km BUT it starts to ride up a bit on the groin. I forgot about this. Over the 6 laps, the wetsuit really started to ride up and squash a certain part of my anatomy, which started to make me feel sick, won’t go into too much detail…I think the swim cap situation on lap 1 & 2 also took its toll…so we stopped after 6 laps. *There was also a weird 30 minutes on lap 6 that saw a southerly wind pick up out of nowhere and create a load of chop. It only lasted half an hour but we had to dig in.

BREAK : hot bath, some food, bit of a rest. It’s August, so I had to answer some emails!

Laps 7-14 was all a bit of a blur. There was a westerly wind on the forecast but I thought it was light enough to not really cause a problem. I was wrong! Whilst it wasn’t too bad, we did have to swim through a bit of chop on each leg. I wore a longer wetsuit but still got cold. Must put on some weight! I saw a very cool Starfish, with blue almost neon kind of nipples on it. I also saw a foot long blue Eel…which was amazing.

I somehow seemed to pick the exact same route on every swim. Nearly swimming into the same rocks on every leg, going over the same seaweed…

Lap 9 I thought about calling it a day and wasn’t confident of finishing, as I started feeling cold again but pushed through.

What I will say about the morning v afternoon was the effect of the tide. Such an amazing seaweed forest around the Mount at low tide. The last lap was also quite creepy. We went from crystal clear waters, to dim and featureless swimming with the sun going down.

The whole swim was put on for an incredible little charity…find out more :