‘Water brave bunch!’ read the headline last week and a few of us were aghast/delighted to see ourselves in swimwear on the cover of a magazine that is sold in every corner store and supermarket nationwide. That warm lighting belies how cold and dark it was – our skin was more the colour of that sea behind us. I’m in the pink hat.

(Great to see that magazines’ definition/understanding of ‘beach ready’ has changed, or at least that there has been progress in that department.)

It was a great article and hopefully inspires other people to start their own groups!

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We had a week of colds at my house and there was heavy rain – so heavy and ongoing that land starting slipping around town and the roads out of my suburb were almost completely cut off. Not that we were going anywhere.

Being sick really makes you appreciate when you’re not sick, so it was great to be out and about again and yesterday I went back to my morning swim group. It was unusually still and the rain had just stopped; the water was cool and clear. We were joined by shags and screeching oystercatchers. Conditions were so lovely that we stayed in for about half an hour!

These two photos were taken by local photographer Liz Ritchie (@Lizzart2), who posts her coastal shots on Instagram. (The person inching on the right is me.)

I took the below photo just as I got to the beach. We have passed the shortest day and so now the sun is rising at morning swim time, hooray! I always feel very privileged that we are the first country to see the sun rise each day (the Chatham Islands/Rēkohu see it first because they are 45 minutes ahead of mainland Aotearoa).

On a related topic, I have treated myself to a print of this beautiful painting from Jane Blackmore of the sun rising over the same mountains.

Waterproof – A Waterbiographical Series of Wild Swims

The brrrave and the bashful