Sunday 24th October 1999

Martin F: "Someone had mentioned the night before that as weekly training (and for fun!!) the Dublin team were in the habit of swimming around an island in the Dublin estuary, just south of Dun Laoghaire, and would we like to join them? At eleven o'clock at night and with six pints of Guinness inside us, this had sounded like a great way to spend a Sunday morning, but the next day things seemed a bit different.

We had been told to be ready at 8am, and at the appointed hour John and Eamonn duly turned up with cars to take us to our start point. Upon arrival, and still trying to sober up, we started to kit up in the wetsuits they had brought for us. After a bit of faffing around and squeezing into gear we were ready for action, albeit still feeling a bit rough!

So Martin R, Martin F, Peter, Linda and Keith W, plus Eileen and Turlough from Brighton entered the water to find it kinda cold. Most got in and tried to warm up, but the Irish just jumped in and off they went!

The island was not as near as I'd hoped/imagined and within ten metres of swimming out of the small harbour I realized I couldn't actually swim against the current. I panicked and turned around and after some frantic swimming got back into the harbour.

The cold and the current had got to me, and as I exited the water to watch the group glide off towards the island the Putney boys arrived! Like mechanics reviewing the condition of your knackered car they exclaimed "with current that strong and water that cold, I wouldn't be wanting to swim around that island".

So, feeling good that I was out of the water, I started to feel concerned for the rest of the group, which was now out of sight and rounding the first island. Then we could see them, but the group had broken up and two seemed to be lagging. As we watched on, these two seemed to take the more direct route back, but due to the current couldn't reach the starting point, and as Martin R and co drifted past the harbour we could see he was in some sort of trouble.

Running down the coast, we eventually met them as they made it to shore and it turned out Martin had cramped up with the cold of the water and probable dehydration as he'd sobered up.

Martin slowly recovered, as after we regrouped we headed off to the local pub for a quick Viagra meal (three oysters and a pint of Guinness!), which got us all over our hangovers . . . if the cold water hadn't!"

Sara: Sara, Colin, Liz, Mark and ?Ed went to Dublina on the recommendation of Martin R and Co, and thanks to improved weather conditions got a better view of Dublin from the top of the tower than the others had on the Friday. Unfortunately the Jameson's distillery was closed (harrumph!). By the early evening, although it was totally unplanned, after various groups wandered around Temple Bar, they all ended up in Porterhouse - an excellent bar on 3 or 4 levels which had a live band playing. As more of us arrived and joined the group we became more and more rowdy, boistrous and inebriated (surely not?!!!!). We all staggered "home" very much under the influence!!