Friday, August 13 2010

In Dover, England

woke at 5:00 am ( 6:00am in France) I slept great
SWIM:  4 hours and 15 minutes

comments:  I woke up too early.  I headed down to the beach (harbor) around 5:45 without a coffee and breakfast.
I was very tired and my stomach hurt – so mentally, I was a total pussy.  I was scheduled to do a 10 hour swim today.  I got to the beach/harbor started to undress in the cold, windy weather … but decided to go find a coffee first, so I got dressed and went looking for a cafe which was open.

Nothing was open – Dover is just a tiny, runned down port city – something I think Morrissey probably sang about, or should have..

Costa coffee opened at 7am, but the nice girl working there made me a coffee at 6:45.

As I drank my coffee, I decided to go back to my bed and breakfast, The Victoria and have breakfast before i swam … and I figured if I started to swim at 8:30, i would be able to finish by 7pm.

The breakfast was ok — but not worth the long walk back to the BB and i regreted wasting the time.
By 8:30 I was back at the beach and in the water to start my swim.

The tides were very low, so i had to walk a long way into the water in knee deep cold water.  I enjoyed the walk in the water because it gave me a few minutes to get used to the cold water.  It was very cold and windy so finally I just dove forward.

The swim in the harbor is a back and forth – about 1,ooo yards each way.  I was very happy because my body seemed to react well to the english channels cold water.  But because I couldnt see where I was going (zero visibilty) I had to keep sticking my head up to ensure i was headed in the right direction, and not past the white stripes which were marked on the side of the harbor to indicate where one could swim and not swim.

I swam very slow and stopped many times and just tread water looking around.

After 2 hours, I went up to the beach to drink something (feed) … the walk up the beach was hell because its tiny pebbles and very steep so it took a good few minutes.

I drank as fast as I could then jogged back into the water to continue my 10 hour challenge.

The time went by very fast – much faster than it does when i swim in the med. but I was very bored.  The more bored I got, the slower I swam … and I started to get cold.

By 4 hour mark, I was very cold …but not as cold as I had been in Austria.  I kept trying to think of different things so to stop being a pussy – but after 4 hours and 15 minutes, i went up to the beach to feed and sat down … I became very cold, and decided to call it a day.

I think I have the flu which probably made my swim more difficult and colder than it should have been.  Mentally, I was a total pussy today — which was also probably exacerbated by not feeling well.

I stayed in bed all day.

All in all, a shit day.