Whale Island swim

On Friday I left work at 1-ish and headed off to Whakatane to attempt the "Whale of a Swim". Quite a pleasant and uneventful drive the weather was pleasant and other than the inevitable roadworks nothing much to talk about. When I arrived at Whakatane I went straight to Piripai beach to see Whale Island. My first thought was "Damn, that's far away". I carried on to the 'motel' where I was staying, which was about 100m from the finish line of the swim. Motel may be generous, it was a flat at the bottom of the house, but was lovely and I had a good night there. A short walk into the town and a pasta meal at the local Italian restaurant and I was ready for bed.

I was up bright and early (5:30) and ready to load kayaks and be briefed at 6:30. Whale island was hazy in the morning behind the statue of Wairaka, but 9.1 km is a long way. But as with many events like this is was a case of "hurry up and wait". A combination of large swells and a very low tide meant that the harbour master had not opened the bar at the river mouth for general traffic and the coastguard was not prepared to take us out until it was 'opened'. It was fine for swimming as there was very little chop, but the briefing was delayed until 8:30. This did not really help my growing anticipation and nerves.

But at 8:30 it was all go, so the kayaks were loaded up and off to the island we went. My kayaker was a great chap called Jim Robinson (so there was a lot of "Hey, Jim", "Yes, Jim", "How are you, Jim", "Good, Jim") who is a multisport enthusiast. He had swapped his normal kayak (which he was told would be too fast) for a sit on one so it was easy to access the bag of powerade and water he was carrying for me.

The swim started at about 10:00, and was quite enjoyable, the water was a tremendous blue colour and as there were not that many swimmer (< 40) and kayaks it was not crowded. The first half or so was plain sailing, I went past the half way marker at about 1:35 but after about 2 hrs of swimming my shoulders started aching. Unfortunately it didn't get any easier from there, the more I swam, the more I felt it and the slower I went. I needed more short little breathers but Jim was always most encouraging, although he did tell me that 3 successive buoys were the '1km to go' buoy! The shore seemed to take ages to get closer, but eventually I was in the surf off Pipipai beach then walking over the sand spit and a final, painful, swim over the river to the finish, all in all it took me 3hr 46 min, but I finished.

One of the most rewarding parts of the event was the number of texts, phone calls and comments I received before and after the event. It was that support that kept me going in the last hour when I was not having too much fun.