On the road again: Colwyn Bay to Rhyl

After a tip-off from my friend Ed (now in Finland, good luck!) about interesting day trips on the North Wales coast, I finally headed off last week to Colwyn Bay with the intention of walking along the coast back to the seaside town of Rhyl. Actually this wasn't one of the routes that Ed had suggested - but I guessed it should be possible as I'd cycled from Prestatyn to Colwyn Bay and back about 9 years ago with some friends on a sponsored bike ride (I still remember my soup at Colwyn Bay on that trip).

I didn't really spend any time in Colwyn itself, instead I headed to the Victoria Pier which I remembered from years before. It's in a bit of a sad state now though, from years of neglect and vandalism - although it doesn't look so bad from a distance in my pictures:

Kyle kindly emailed me a link to the Wikipedia entry at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Victoria_Pier, which tells the rather story of the pier's slow decline over the last 50 years or so. It also looked like a new leisure complex was being built nearby while I sat and had a cup of tea there.

Heading eastwards much of the route is sandwiched between the coast and either the railway or the A55 road, and aside from occasional further dereliction (abandoned mine workings, water tanks and sea platforms) there isn't really a lot to see between Colwyn Bay and Abegele. But I liked the solitude, and was fascinated by mile upon mile of the coastal defences made from dolosse - hundreds (or more likely tens of thousands) of large concrete blocks piled up along the coast line like over-sized children's toys:

After 6 miles I finally reached the beach at Abergele and Pensarn, where there are holiday caravans, families on the beach, and fish and chips. (Apparently there's also a reef but it was high tide when I arrived). After toying with the idea of getting the train from the nearby station I decided to carry on to the next town, which I'm still not sure was the best idea - my feet were feeling pretty sore 4 miles later as I reached the seafront at Rhyl. But it was a memorable sight, and there was ice cream:

I didn't spend much time in Rhyl, which was perhaps a shame as it looked like a nice place to have a bit of a wander around. But it was a great day out, and as one of Ed's suggestions was to walk from Prestatyn to Rhyl, maybe I'll try that next time - though I need to let my feet recover a little first.

Great Salford Swim & The Twin Lake Challenge

With starting a new job in May, it's taken me a while to get around to posting about the two outdoor swimming challenges that I took part in over a month ago: the first was the Great Salford Swim, and the second was my friend Hacky's "Twin Lakes Challenge" the following weekend - two quite different but equally memorable events.

Great Salford Swim: Sunday 15th May

The Great Salford Swim is part of the Great Swim series of mass participation swimming events, and this year around 2,000 people took part, braving the drizzly weather and cold water (14.4C, though I've felt colder so maybe I'm acclimatising) to swim a one mile "dock-to-dock" course at Salford Quays. Swimmers were organised into different coloured "waves" (I was in the yellow wave) and included various celebrities (such as Blue Peter presenter Andy Akinowolere, in the same wave as me) as well as men and women's elite races, featuring amongst others the British Olympians Keri-Anne Payne and Cassie Patten.

The organisation of the event was extremely impressive, with things running astonishingly smoothly in spite of the volume of people involved: I'd already received my race pack a couple of weeks earlier, which included my race number, official swim hat, timing chip and velcro ankle strap, and a baggage label (for the bag transfer between the start and finish). So on the day all I had to do was turn up, get changed and drop off my bag, and then head to the start line. After a quick warm up session (lots of people in wetsuits bending, bouncing and stretching - no doubt most entertaining for the assembled spectators) and dip in the "acclimatisation area", we lined up and were off into the water.

As I've said here before, although I feel I'm a very competent pool swimmer and have no problem swimming front crawl over a mile indoors (in fact I'd easily done 2km the week before, in the 50m pool at the Manchester Aquatics Centre), I often struggle to translate this to outdoor swimming. As a result I swam breaststroke for a large percentage of the course, with an occasional burst of crawl (including my favourite part, on the final strait to the finishing line). So while I felt that my time of 41m 41s was pretty respectable, I also felt I could have gone a little quicker (and I'm considering what things I need to work on for the future). But still, completing the one mile swim was an achievement to be proud of! Here's the official post-swim picture to prove it:


The Twin Lake Challenge: Saturday 21st May

The following weekend was a very different kind of outdoor swimming experience: Hacky's "Twin Lake Challenge", which involved a group of committed (or possibly certified) swimmers trying to swim the highest lake in Wales (Llyn Llyffant in Snowdonia) and in England (Malham Tarn in Yorkshire) in the same day. The challenge was two-fold - not only the distance between the two lakes, but also the fact that Llyn Llyffant is only accessible by a 7km walk which includes a 3,000 ft elevation to the lake. Like most of these things it had seemed like a good idea two months earlier (when I was sat cosy and warm in front of a laptop).

Through some impressive and ingenious logistical planning, Hacky managed to get eight of us gathered around 9am in the remote carpark in Snowdonia, the starting point for the trek up to the first lake. Buffeted by a persistent chilly wind (and with some ominously dark clouds lurking rather too close for my liking), I’m sure I wasn’t the only one feeling a little uncertain. But we were here now, and one way or another it was definitely going to be an adventure! and certainly the ascent to Llyn Llyffant was challenging, through a landscape of a spectacular and desolate beauty featuring huge walls, abandoned slate works, hidden bog puddles, and fragments of a WWII plane wreck.

With increasingly grim determination we finally reached our objective a few hours later, and were rewarded with a striking sight – a small lake with clear cold water rippled by the wind, and surrounded by rocks surreally peppered with more wreckage (including an engine and a wheel). We quickly changed into our wetsuits and with some trepidation (as least for me!) made our way into the icy water: the bottom of the lake seemed to consist of thick boggy mud over uneven rocks, and I felt my exposed hands and feet turn to blocks of ice almost immediately as I managed to breaststroke a width of the lake. Other hardier souls were able to stay in longer, but it was enough for me to say that I’d swum in the highest lake in Wales – made even more special by its remoteness and all the effort taken to get there - and to get the obligatory wetsuit picture (thanks to Jo Brown for this):


There wasn’t much time to savour our achievement however – almost as soon as we got out of the water the rain started, and the hike back was a gloriously miserable affair as we got wetter and wetter (more than when we were in the lake, even). No time to dwell on it though once we reached the carpark again – we still had another lake to get to! So began the long dash cross-country to Yorkshire, picking up more outdoor swimmers along the way before we arrived at the second lake.

Malham Tarn was a real contrast to Llyn Llyffant – a much bigger body of water, but more easily accessible just a short walk across a field from a carpark – and perhaps seemed a little ordinary after the adventure we’d had earlier in Wales. Still there was good swimming to be had here – the water again cold but beautifully clear, with the rocky lake bottom visible beneath and trees lining the more distant lakesides; and while the sky was overcast the rain held off long enough for our pod of 15 or so swimmers to get a good long swim. My favourite memories include chasing after a crowd of bobbing coloured swim hats (I’m not a fast swimmer); continually mistaking two pillars at the lakeside on the way back for two non-swimmers who’d come along with us; and leaving the water at the end through what felt like hundreds of “British Gas Great Swim” flip-flops, temporary abandoned by people when they’d first got in.

And then that was it – shivering as I ran back to the parked car, struggling into my warm dry clothes, and feeling the satisfaction of completing the challenge. Gathering in a pub nearby we were finally able to relax and reflect on our achievement. It might look like madness from the outside, but for me it’s during experiences like this that life seems to be at its most colourful. Thanks to Hacky and everyone else who made it such a fantastic day in so many ways: I know that the vivid memories of this Twin Lake Challenge – and Llyn Llyffant in particular – will stay with me for a life-time. Plus, Hacky also gave us a mug for completing both parts:

Since then it's been a bit quiet on the swimming front, but I'm now slowly getting back into a regular early morning pool-swimming schedule - so once things calm down I'm sure I'll be looking for the next swimming challenge!

Silver Screen Suppers

For a while now I've been a quiet fan of the Silver Screen Suppers blog, written by a multi-talented friend of mine (let's call her Lya di Putti). The blog is about an ongoing project between her and a friend - collecting and recreating dishes from recipes attributed to movie stars of Hollywood's Golden Age - mixed in with episodes from her own often movie-star-esque life.

At the moment she's in the process of putting together a book of the best recipes (their stash now has over 4,000 so it's a big job) and she periodically asks for volunteers to act as test cooks and give feedback on how the recipes turn out. Since I like to think I'm a helpful sort (plus I secretly want to get into the book) I've tried a few myself over the last year: Veronica Lake's Spiced Beef and Peas, Gary Cooper's Buttermilk Griddle Cakes, Loretta Young's Walnut Loaf (in the picture above), John Wayne's Mustard Steak, Greta Garbo's Swedish Meatballs (oops, just blown my anonymity) and most recently Thelma Todd's Scripture Cake:

I'm not a great cook by any stretch: writing up my less successful attempts - the meatballs for example were a bit of a disaster - took me back to school science reports (an appalling experimental scientist, I was forever having to explain why my results didn't agree with theory). But it's been educational and fun, and there have been some real treats too - I've been thinking for a while that I should take another pop at Gary Cooper's delicious griddle cakes; Loretta's walnut loaf involved some interesting detective work and turned out surprisingly tasty; and Thelma's scripture cake was excellent (as well as being a clever Biblical puzzle to figure out the ingredients).

I've also been fascinated by the sparseness and simplicity of many of the recipes, which (alongside some baffling ingredients - for example, just what is the "spiced beef" in Veronica Lake's recipe?) hint at a time when people were more well-versed in cooking and baking: they already knew what a moderate oven temperature was without having to look it up, and didn't need every step or measurement spelled out in explicit detail.

The recipes themselves don't appear on the blog, so if you're interested in trying some of them then you'll have to either wait for the book, sign up to the Silver Screen Suppers email newsletter (front page of the blog) to get a monthly recipe (complete with video!), or offer to be a test cook. It's definitely worth a go if you fancy a culinary adventure, and you'll also get a mention in the book.

Now, where did I put that measuring cup...?

Walking in the Lake District

Just over a week ago I spent a very enjoyable weekend with my friend Ronan walking in the Lake District. We seem to have ended up doing something similar around this time of year for a while now; this time the plan was to go to the western lakes around Wasdale, spending the first day trying to climb Scafell Pike (the highest peak in England at 978 metres/3209 feet), and the second doing something a bit gentler before coming back.

Since it's a pretty long drive from here to Wasdale even without negotiating windy narrow and unlit roads of the Western Lakes, we set off on the Friday evening in a rented 4x4 (looking completely like tourists) for lodgings in Arnside. The town is on the southern edge of the Lakes, on the estuary of the River Kent (the north-east corner of Morecambe Bay); by the time we arrived it was dark and the estuary was a strange silvery presence alongside our walk to the Albion pub, oddly quiet and slightly magical: trains moving slowly on the distant opposite bank looked like travelling buildings in the darkness.

The next morning we followed twisty roads up and down hills on the way to Wasdale. In spite of the overcast and slightly hazy weather, the mountains of the Western Lakes were an inspiring sight - as was Wastwater, with the steep mountainsides appearing to plunge directly into the lake. Arriving at Wasdale Head, our attempt on Scafell Pike finally began - Ronan had picked out a less direct route to the peak that we hoped would be more scenic, and we set off. Even our gentler ascent involved some committed walking but we quickly climbed up the side of the valley (in my experience it pays to stop and look back from time when going uphill, to remind yourself that you're making progress). In spite of the wind and rain it was a good walk up - the paths are generally well maintained and we were rewarded with a couple of wonderful-looking tarns, which I could imagine swimming in later in the year:

Eventually though we encountered snow and mist (low cloud, really); the visibility dropped and the snow was often loose and slippery so progress was slower, but finally we reached 920m:

Sadly this was as high as we'd get - we couldn't see the obvious route to the peak of Scafell Pike, though on the map we could see it was close. Even so this remains one of my favourite moments of the weekend - stopping by the cairn we seemed to have been transported to an eerily tranquil place (even the wind was silent), devoid of landmarks or people. It was a little bit magical.

After the highs of course you have to come down! The ascent was tiring but fortunately our overnight accommodation at Rainors Farm (a really nice friendly B&B that also offers yurts - maybe next time - and which I would completely recommend) was very welcoming after all the walking, and an (ahem) "interesting" evening out at a pub in Gosforth rounded the day off nicely.

The next day the weather seemed a little more settled and we wondered briefly about trying for Scafell Pike again, before deciding on something a little less taxing - the mountains aren't going anywhere, and it was debatable whether my sore feet and legs would actually be able to get me there. Instead we walked up to Whin Rigg on the other side of Wasdale, with commanding views of the surrounding countryside out to the coast (including the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant), and beyond. Incidents involving Ronan's lost hat - happily recovered on the way back - and a tin of chicken soup added some light drama (or maybe comic relief?) but nothing we couldn't handle.

It's always a little sad driving back after a great weekend, but a detour through Morecambe took the edge off: nothing like fish chips, a view over the bay, and a chance to spend a bit of quality time with one of the town's most famous sons:

Bring me sunshine, indeed. What a great weekend!

New Year Swimming

Where did January go? It doesn't seem a month since I started the year off with the "Icebreaker Swim" (actually more of a dip) in the frozen-over lake at Manley Mere with two of the friends I met outdoor swimming last year. I'd thought after the OSS December Dip that it would be a lot longer than 3 weeks before I would be a) back in the water outside, and b) in a wetsuit, but in the event it turned out to be an excellent way to start the year. (It also persuaded me that it's time to invest in a pair of swimming gloves.)

Since then I've been swimming in the relative warmth of the pool, and working on my backstroke (which is starting to become a very relaxing stroke now that I can go mostly in a straight line) in between bouts of breast stroke and crawl. A lot of people are already making all kinds of big plans for epic outdoor swims later in the year, and as a result I'm feeling a bit behind already - so far all I'm definite about is an Art of Swimming weekend butterfly course (hopefully in Manchester, and hopefully using the voucher I got after my Scillies write-up got published on the Shaw Method website in December). I'm not so fussed about the smashing-through-the-water aspect of butterfly, but I've always been both fascinated and intrigued by the dolphin-like undulation of the stroke, and I think it would be fun to learn how to do it.

At the moment though outdoor swimming is still some way off in the year. I'm thinking vaguely about a Swimtrek weekend in the Lake District, but I think I'd also like to try some more sea swimming (like the Llandudno swim that I did last June, or maybe Burgh Island in September ... the danger of course is that while I'm still day-dreaming about them, everyone else has actually signed up and there won't be any places left by the time I decide to commit).

In the meantime I'm content to admire Hannah Booth's write up of her Greek Swimtrek holiday (and the accompanying pictures) from last Saturday's Guardian, and - at the other extreme - the amazing feats of people like Jack Bright, who's making a film about winter swimming. For now I'll remember Colin Hill's words from the December Dip, that the foundations for outdoor swimming is laid down by your indoor swimming, and keep on with my lengths while waiting for warmer weather.

December Snow

Last Friday night was another unseasonably heavy snowfall across the country, and on Saturday morning like everyone else I woke up to a bright white landscape. I know this isn't good news for everyone, but I still find a covering of snow to be a little bit magical. I suppose it takes me back to my childhood and memories of school being closed, the normal rules of life are suspended.

Buoyed by this feeling I decided on a whim I'd take my camera and go for a walk up to the park and round the river. These are places that I've been running through the past year, watching with interest how they've changed with the seasons, but heavy snow is something else again in the way it transforms our everyday surroundings. The familiar is rendered strangely unrecognisable: we can become disoriented as regular landmarks are hidden, while at the same time things that usually go unnoticed are suddenly revealed - or some cases not only revealed but transmogrified.

For example, just what is this?

It's a great opportunity to see the world anew, or at least just a little askew - even the familar Warrington landmarks can look refreshed with a silvery dusting:

As with all magic, the snow also has its dangers: travel can become hazardous and the everyday business of life can be disrupted. It's a reminder of how fragile the structures and routines of our lives really are, and of how little control we really have over them (and I'd rather be reminded of that by something gentle and relatively benign, like snow, rather than say by an earthquake). I think it's telling when people try (quite literally) to plough on when the sensible thing to do is just stop for a while. But if you are able to take time out then the world can suddenly seem like a friendlier and more relaxed place.

So even though I don't know if the snow will cause problems travelling back tomorrow to spend Christmas with my family, I'm feeling quite relaxed - I hardly dare say chilled in fact - about it. And even if all other modes of transport are disrupted, I know now that I might still have options...

Merry Christmas!

OSS December Dip: Plum Pudding Plunge

About a week ago I travelled down to Parliament Hill Lido in London to take part in the Outdoor Swimming Society's 2010 December Dip (aka "the plum pudding plunge"), an annual fund-raising event for the OSS. It's pretty simple: a bunch of people line up at the edge of the pool, jump in and swim, with the aim of completing two widths of the lido before getting out again as fast as possible. Brrr!

The Dip was preceded by pep talks from Kate Rew (the OSS founder) and two great guest speakers - Jessica Hynes (actress, writer and comedian best known to me for her work on the insanely brilliant Spaced - my favourite ever TV sitcom) and Colin Hill (distance swimmer and founder of the Great Swim series of events). Jessica spoke about her enthusiasm for the Outdoor Swimming Society's mission to promote having fun of all kinds in water outdoors (the society is very egalitarian: all you have to do to call yourself a member is to like being in water outdoors, although by signing up for free on their website you also receive a regular email newsletter); Colin talked about the psychology of longer outdoor swims, and suggested ways that indoor pool swimming over the winter could help prepare (a point that outdoor swimmers don't always seem to concede).

After the talks came the actual plunge. I'd swum outdoors in London almost exactly a year earlier, but that was in the heated pool at the Oasis - this time the water was an icy 0.1C (32.2F), and with patches of snow around the poolside to add atmosphere. All through the previous week I'd become increasingly aware of the cold, until even washing my hands in cold water had made me think nervously about the event; but as the air temperature felt relatively mild on the day I didn't really feel worried until the last few minutes before when everyone lined up by the water (and I tried not to think of the risks I'd read about cold water immersion - hopefully this wouldn't be the last thing I ever did...).

Everyone had their own method of entering the water, but after my experiences swimming the Scillies my preferred technique is simply to jump straight in (one useful bit of advice is to breathe out as you enter the water so that you naturally take an in-breath when you surface) and then swim like mad. The cold water made it difficult to breath normally and impaired my swimming ability (while also making my hands and feet feel literally as if they were encased in blocks of ice) so I was glad to complete my two widths and jump back out again.

Afterwards it took a while to get warmed up again but to help there was hot chocolate, mince pies, ginger wine and a very congenial atmosphere. I talked to a few people about where they'd come from and the kind of swimming they did, which was good as I don't really talk to many other swimmers - I think that outdoor swimming does tend to be a bit more social than pool swimming. I'm not sure that I had an immediate endorphin rush but I did feel extremely mellow and relaxed for the rest of the day, and that's good enough for me.

There are reports of the event online from Sky News (which has video footage, although you can't see me in it) and the BBC. In hindsight I can't say that I had a particularly definite reason for doing the dip, except that it seemed like a good way to round off 2010 as a year of outdoor swimming. I'm continuing to swim indoors (I rarely stop these days), but now I'm also looking forward to more outdoor dips in 2011.

Happy festive swimming!