At 4am on the Sunday we left Australia, a young distance swimmer named Chloe McCardel entered the water at Bondi Beach to attempt a record-breaking 60 laps of the bay. That happens to be 48km, or nearly 30 miles. It took her eleven hours. I’d arrived at the beach that morning a little after 5am to prepare for the sunrise. It was uneventful due to a thick layer of cloud that lay on the horizon and blocked all the sweet light. But even in the dark I could see a swimmer and someone on a surfboard moving slowly from one side of the bay to the other. Large orange buoys had been placed with GPS-accuracy at each end and in the middle of her path, and slowly the sixty laps ticked off.
I photographed the surfers as the light came up, met my family for breakfast, brought my 6-yr-old to the beach to play in the waves. We met friends, packed suitcases in preparation of our departure, had one last dip in the ocean before showering and racing away in a taxi. Chloe swam on. Hours later she’d completed her marathon (though it was actually longer than a marathon and given that she swam the distance, even more amazing a feat) and set her record. I was going to tweet or post about it but it took a couple of days to confirm that she’d accomplished her goal. You can read her report on her blog, here. The world is full of amazing people, motivated to do incredible things. I’m glad I got at least one image of her in the morning light.
I’d pointed her out to my older daughter, herself an avid swimmer who has been in lessons for most of her 6 years. The distance was impossible for her to understand, of course, but she did put the feat into terms she could understand, thanks to Pixar: Just keep swimming, just keep swimming.
Congratulations, Chloe, on a fantastic, inspiring accomplishment.
