I set off at dawn as planned but a strong northwards current swept me in a huge arc of 35km and left me battling, in the dark, after 12hrs of swimming, to make the final km into shore. But the current and waves were like a conveyor belt around the land and it pulled me past the last possible landing point - it was too dangerous to go on.
The disappointment of being pulled back into the boat so close to my dream left me reeling but has fuelled my determination to do this even more! There are a few technical glitches to iron out (errr like not dropping the GPS in the water) but the most important thing will be to monitor the weather patterns that create the lake currents and choose the right window in the year. Nature is not to be underestimated!
In the meantime I will continue campaigning for Microloan Foundation and will use this experience of taking a risk and learning lessons when things don't go to plan (!) to try and motivate women who are also taking risks by having the courage to take out small loans to develop their business ideas. Pushing physical limits is one way of finding out what you're really made of and the confidence it generates can have positive ramifications on all other areas of your life. I would like to help Microloan Foundation to organise some mountain walks and lake trips for some of the savings groups here in Malawi and hope that these challenges energise women in the same way mine has!
I will be updating the website soon with the whole story of the 1 May swim attempt and will update everyone when I decide the date of the second attempt!
www.lakemalawiswim.org
