Made it to Relatives in Lyme Regis last weekend. Lisa and I stayed with my Aunty Wendy and Uncle Keith in Axminster and were thoroughly well looked after. It's always a positive time down with them, very very energising it is! Cousin Ian also came down for some R&R away from the craziness of London. Good place to find it i reckon!
Saturday was a good day, sunny for a change, and warm. Aunty Wo and I felt like hitting the water that morning, so went to Lyme Regis. Aunty Wo has been known to dabble in some silly swimming in her time, notably a charity swim on Christmas Day a couple years back for the RNLI. Thoroughly silly but suitably respectable for all ocean swimmers! Her love of the water is what drags her in!
So, in the sunshine of a british summer we marched into the waves at Lyme Regis. The lifeguard board said the temp was 15 degrees, THAT'S MORE LIKE IT!!! Superb conditions for it, light swell, nothing too dramatic and just crisp enough to make your face and toes tingle. The taste of salt water comes flooding back to your memory and it was like being back on the northern beaches of Sydney. Good times.
I knocked out a couple of km along the bouys before heading back in. While we warmed up we chatted about it being LifeBoat week at Lyme and I decided to go and find some lifeguards and chat about what they actually find themselves doing on a daily basis.
I found Becky and Charlotte manning the beach that morning. See top pic here. They had just performed a couple of demo rescues to illustrate how they are used to keep an eye on the general public. Surprisingly they are fully salaried life guards. Apparently there are not enough volunteers in that part of the world so they have to have full-timers on patrol six days a week. See, that's where the money is needed, full time professional staff. Charlotte told me that in Lyme it is not so much the rescuing as the first aid that is the needed skill. as there is a 25minute response time from the nearest paramedic, it is vital for them to have the skills to resuscitate and revive while the paras arrive. Tough job and a lot of responsibility. It was good to meet them and they wished me luck for the swim. Check them out at:
All in all a good morning out on the beach.
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