I had the great pleasure of walking round the Isle of Wight a couple of years ago and stayed one night in a B&B near Yarmouth.  I noticed the host had swum across the Solent because he had a little certificate on the wall. Knowing the Solent from my early years I had always thought this impossible for tide and shipping traffic reasons rather than distance.  I had a good chat with him about his crossing and thus started my ambition to do the swim myself.

In January this year I researched charities that support Solent crossings and found Aspire. I applied, full of doubt, because my main fear was being too slow and inexperienced in sea swimming to be considered. The kindness of the Aspire team at every step of the process, and their encouragement gave me enough motivation to enter.

So, my challenge started – and that meant getting out of bed in the early morning and down to my local pool to swim laps in January, gradually building up time and distance.   Progressing steadily if not elegantly (or indeed particularly swiftly) until the spring and the opening of local open water swim venues. Here I found advice and support from a well-informed community of swimmers and on I went (or rather round and round the laps!) – picking up hints and tips along the way.

I forced myself to overcome my irrational fear of sharks and orcas. If you google ‘shark attacks in the Solent’ your social media feeds will serve you relentless news on every nibble any shark has taken of anyone, anywhere in the world.  So, I stopped with that pretty quickly.

By the summer I was swimming twice a week in a lake – and on average around 6.5km. I swam 240km in total to my swimming date (30th September), some weeks with longer swim distances.  I completed the required 2-hour observed swim in Dover harbour in somewhat choppy conditions and realised I could translate from lake to sea (or cauldron that particular day) without too much fuss.

Finally – after three postponements due to weather – when I had more or less given up hope, a weather window opened and on a superb, still and breathtakingly beautiful day I turned up at Stokes Bay and with four other Aspire swimmers and our lovely kayak crew, we got in the water and got on with it.

We paused just as we got to the shipping lane to ensure we were grouped together for that stretch – so for some glorious minutes in the middle of the Solent I was resting on my back looking up at the blue sky – just a moment of enjoyment and gratitude.   

Crossing done and back at Stokes Bay – big grin – marvellous pizza and quite a sense of personal achievement.  Along the way I managed to raise £1,600 for Aspire, mostly from my family and I am very grateful to them – and delighted to support the important work that Aspire does to help people.

It is certainly a challenge that took me out of my comfort zone, opened my eyes to a whole new community and helped me focus through some difficult life events in the summer.

I would like to thank all the people at Aspire - especially Andrew Ogierman - and all the volunteers for organising a safe and positive experience for the swimmers. 

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