The 1st Palmer Dart

11th September 2010 marked the day of our first ever organised Totnes to Stoke Gabriel swim, named temporarily by our friends as 'The Palmer Dart'. We had 30 swimmers and over 30 support boats. The Stoke Gabriel Boating Association provided us with astonishing support and it was a day to top most other Saturdays this year (for me).

Surrounded by lovely local swimmers, my fondest friends from South London Swimming Club and swimming next to my gorgeous husband I had one of the best swims I've had in the River ever ever! The water was flat calm and silky smooth and it was easy to swim through, astonishingly so.

Two astonishings already - you see that is what the day was like from start to finish.

The day was slightly grey and drizzly but the weather front was passing and the water was in perfect condition.

We set off in 3 waves, the more relaxed swimmers first, I call them the watchers, they like to drift down the river watching the scenery taking it all in, they really make the most of every swim. The 2nd group to go was the slightly faster group, they entered the water with some descriptions of the water temperature, mostly polite and lots of smiles. We were then left with the speedy ones, the channel swimmers, the 2-way windermere swimmers and quite simply the down right nifty ones.

I followed them in my support boat deftly navigated by Roger and meandered my way through half of the swimmers before finding Stuart who was swimming at an impressive pace. Just before Sharpham I slid daintily from the boat (that's not quite how it happened but it's my blog so I'll describe it how I like!) and joined Stuart to swim the rest of the way back to Stoke Gabriel.

I smiled the whole way, I felt so good in the water, what a buzz to have organised this local event and to actually be able to take part in it.

We ended the swim at the River Shack in Stoke Gabriel where Tim and Lexi had put on some delicious bacon and sausage baps for us and served 65 of us in under an hour, whilst I know it's good for business they really pulled the stops out to help us out and we all sat eating and drinking in the glorious sunshine for a good few hours.

Once again I find myself dangerously close to going totally over the top in describing just how wonderfully lucky I feel to know and be associated with so many kind and caring people all up for being in and on the river early on a September morning.

I am really very lucky! Bring on the Palmer-Dart 2011. I'm looking forward to it already.