Cold water swimmers including sea, lakes and rivers

[TriSkiRun99]

After sea swimming regularly since May I’m hoping to carry on. Is anyone else hoping to carry on open water or sea swimming through the winter? If you fancy supporting each other and sharing hints n tips come join me. I’ve just bought some socks and neoprene hat, I’m hoping to to stay in my cossie as long as possible but I do have a wet suit if I cave.

Lovely evening swim in lockdown! 13 degrees maybe...

It's turning into a photo competition round here, so here's mine from this morning . I went after dropping the dc to school. I can't swim properly at the moment because I hurt my shoulder but I was in for 10mins treading water. Google tells me the water was 12.9, car said air temp was 8. Does anyone have a more precise way of gauging the water temperature?

I love the idea of your cold tub Dibbler. I'm definitely not brave enough to try that.

I am swimming tomorrow and so excited- I’ve done both of my Polar bear swims for this months so from now on it’s just about being in the water.
Does anyone know anywhere that’s selling cskin socks in a size small, I’m hoping to ask for them for Xmas but can’t find them in stock anywhere!
Love seeing everyone’s photos, some amazing settings we all get to swim in.

I managed to get in a river swim this morning and it was lovely - 9.5', but the sun was shining , and its a beautiful spot. People in the car park were massively confused though!

Local swimming group says high tide at 2 and there is someone making music too but I may have to just take the kids for a paddle as I've promised DH he can watch the football and the kids need a run out like dogs but aren't both good enough for sea swimming.

Went for a river swim this morning and it was a lot colder than in the week. I saw it had been measured yesterday 8.8 degrees. Really felt it on my hands.

To the pp asking about socks - I spent ages looking for some online. In the end I got some from Decathlon.

Socks and gloves in the smaller (women's) sizes are scarce

I’ve got the decathlon ones Mooserp and they do the job, but a year on and they keep falling down when I kick. I’m desperate for some c skins but there are none anywhere in stock size small.
Had a lovely dip this morning and got to practice my front crawl a little bit.
My top tip is to take some warm tap water in a bottle/milk carton and I pour over my feet with my bootys on to get sand of then over my feet to get any sand off.

13 degrees air temp here today - huge improvement on the 6 on Thursday!
Not sure of water temp as our temperature measurer was missing today 😀
8 ladies today 😊

Lovely to see all the swims. Had a good but bit of a bumpy chop to the swell swim this morning saw a few friends from a distance to say hello but we changed in pairs to keep within the restrictions. The winds and swell look like they maybe building again this week so not sure when I’ll get another swim in.

My swim today was in the dark, by açcident rather than design. I got sidetracked with some stuff this afternoon so didn't get going on time and it got dark very quickly. Luckily there were some men fishing beside me, but I only stayed in for 10 mins. The waves were quite high but not breaking so I felt safe enough and I stayed very close to shore. And I had a little torch for my bouy. I'm glad I went.

@Motherforkinshirtballs that sounds very brave. I always find swimming in the dark utterly terrifying. It plays on my fear on not knowing what is underneath you. I swam at dusk the other evening and that was quite dark enough! Will you do it again?

We love swimming in the dark,but have got good places with lights nearby to go off. So it's not totally dark iyswim. We had a bit of bioluminescence the other night. No pics of night swim, but this is one of the day spots

Ooh Ringsender2 that sea pool looks amazing!

Lovely sunrise SeaSwim this morning it felt warm and calm hard to believe it was November. Quite a few others, mostly ladies in 1/2s out swimming too, all us crazy out at 7-7.30am but socially distancing.

I tried to go for a swim this morning but the waves were way too big and crashy to risk it. It would definitely have cleared the cobwebs if I had!

Choppy afternoon swim but where I swim we’re protected by piers so swell and waves not bad at all.

Sneaky lunch break dip between conference calls - luckily not video calls so wearing a bubble hat wasn’t an issue so pleased I’ve managed 7 November sea swims to date. Next week maybe more challenging as big swell and stronger winds forecast.

Seven this month is excellent, Tri. I think today was five for me. I snuck out too and it was blissful. I stupidly went a bit too far with the current though (because I was enjoying it) so was in the water longer than planned battling back. I had a blue toe for most of the afternoon. Lesson learned

Ooh sounds like a chilly one mother, I always time myself so turn back to shore after 5-8mins at the moment as 15mins in cossie is my limit or I just struggle to warm up after. If we get a calm patch soon I’ll fish out my wetsuit so I can have a good solid swim as missing my pool time at the moment.

Yeah, I was in for 25 . Definitely need to keep it to 20 mins max for now.

Watching with interest

Went in today with my mum for a 20 minute bob about. The weather was horrendous, horizontal rain, but the beach was full and there was probably 40-50 swimmers and surfers in the water.

We spoke to some women, middle aged and older like us, and they were so happy and positive to be doing something fun on such a horrible day, it was really uplifting to hear them laugh.

I had a lovely 40 min swim in the river today. It was rather rainy, but surprisingly nice in the water with a wetsuit

We managed to swim 1km in a local lake yesterday as it was fairly calm first thing, water temp was only 7/8 degrees so the brain freeze was real

I'm feeling confident we can make it right through the season and it's also made me realise that in summer I can ditch my wetsuit, I seem to have a new found open water swim confidence!!

I got in the sea today. Not sure of the temperature, probably about 12 degrees. It was much colder and windier when I got out! I was in for 15 mins but with this shoulder injury I was just bobbing about and treading water. I saw a woman get into an amazing onesie after her swim so I'm off to google them!