After volunteering to help the clean up after Hurricane Katrina in the US, Amazon Watch supporter Edward Montgomery embarked on a journey to see how the worlds of business and the environment could be combined for mutual benefit. On July 15th, Edward and four friends completed the 45 km swim across the UK Channel to raise awareness and funds for the work of Amazon Watch. In his own words, “As the Amazon basin is increasingly subjected to industrial natural resource extraction, its rainforests and indigenous peoples are in ever greater need of all of our support.”
Below is a note from Edward about his UK channel swim to raise money for Amazon Watch. So far he has raised upwards of $9,500. Thank you, Edward!
After 12 hours and 35 minutes, I am pleased to say the team and I completed the 45 km UK Channel swim to France on Saturday afternoon. I have detailed below how it went.
1 am – I wake after about 4 hours of sleep to pouring rain and thunderstorms in the distance…nothing like what our “reliable” weather website was telling us. Alas, when you decide to go, unless the skipper says otherwise, you go. Storms pass, I tell myself.
2 am – We meet the skipper, raincoats on, spirits are high. We debrief with the skipper and the UK Channel swim representative who comes with us on the boat to make sure we complete the journey. Pack the boat. Four boats set sail for the attempt that day. The boat we took was not the biggest sea vessel, but it’s trustworthy.
3:30 am – First swimmer in the water with glow sticks and beacon on his cap beaming, speedos on, all pretty excited. Seas quite calm with only the rain and lightening in the distance. One of our team members starts to get sea sick…and he is sea sick the whole journey. I’ve never seen someone so ill. I’ve taken motion sickness tablets and I’m praying they work (they do thankfully).
5:30 am – I hit the water, and we are in the open sea by now, and swells start to build. Out of all my legs I found this the most difficult, as I couldn’t find any rhythm with all the swell and rain. Each stroke you just hope you don’t take on any water. After an hour I tag the next team mate and so the journey continues. When you get out all you want to do is get warm, drink something hot and sit down. Water temperatures were actually okay, around 15-16°C and we had trained in a lot colder. When on the boat, you get as much gear on as you can. I had my ski gear!
9 am – We hear on the radio one of the other boats has pulled out as the weather is too bad and they decided not to go on. Not a great sign as I look and see half my team mates hanging over the side of the boat! The captain says, “in 25 years I’ve never been out in such conditions. We should never have left, and look at your team mates…” Great. For the first time, doubt starts to set in….
12 am – …on the radio…another boat pulls out. I thought this day would be different. I had brought some magazines, sunglasses even sunscreen thinking I would be rather idle on the boat. I was like Dr. Montgomery helping the seasick and your turn to swim keeps coming around quicker and quicker. But when I see one of my team mates who has been throwing up for hours hit the water and complete his leg, I have no doubt we will make it. The others see this, and we soldier on. The Captain sees it too, and finally smiles.
1 pm – We get an hour of sun. It’s amazing how the small things become so meaningful when you’re cold and tired. We soak it up. Also since this is the busiest shipping channel in the world, you see some amazing tankers and cargo ships cruise by. Makes the boat you are on seem even smaller…
2 pm – We almost crash with the last swimming boat attempting that day. How this happened I will never know. We are two small boats in open waters, and we almost collide. We somehow get tangled and the swimmers in the water cross each other, and when you are in the water swimming, you look up for encouragement to the boat, but your hearing is a blur. After a bit of “captain banta” between the two boat capitains, we move clear. It sets in place an even more serious rivalry between the boats and we are determined to beat them.
3 pm – We are no more then two miles from France. I can virtually see the croissants being eaten, but like most things in life, the last 5% of achieving a goal are the hardest. Not that it was physically that hard; it was that the tides cross at that point, making moving forward hard. You have to pound your way through the tides to get near the coast where it is clear. 0.8 miles out, I am sent in, the last swimmer for the day and the one to touch France. And it feels like a washing machine in the water. I can hear the captain say, “he’s going backwards.” I didn’t like hearing that and after a good half hour, I get through the tides and you power towards the coast. I hit France much to our relief in 12 hours and 35 minutes! We all swim to shore, high fives, before getting back on the boat for the four-hour trip home.
We beat the other boat, by the way, as we see it drifting off past a point which the skipper says can add another two to four hours to your swim. Even though I wanted to beat them, I feel sorry they potentially have another four hours to go. We sit on the boat, open a few beers, share stories and reflect on the day. We hit the UK shores and it has never felt so reassuring, especially for the two that were seasick!
Would I do it again, I have been asked? Perhaps, if the conditions were solid. In the rain with over six-foot swells at times, never!
But after the weekend, above all I have been humbled by the generosity and kind words I have had helping to raise money for Amazon Watch. Without your kind support, none of this would have happened, and I am eternally grateful.
Thank you!
– Monty
