Wednesday's Tipping Point.

This is Miriam’s 11th trip with us, and during each trip, she shares the blog posts on facebook, always with some succinct but powerful one liner about what swimming in open water awakens in her. This morning she posted:

Reaching harmony between holding on and letting go.

Wednesday is a day we register in multiple ways on SwimVacation. In a 6 day immersion in the ocean, the third day is often a tipping point - the line of demarcation between before and after. We manage to hang on to the clutter and stress of our lives through Monday and most of Tuesday. By Wednesday, the sea simply won’t have it any more. The facade is stripped away and the truth is pulled from us via fatigue and salt induced osmosis.

This transition is sometimes quiet and sometimes apparent. Regardless, as guides, we know to be on the lookout on Wednesdays; to stay on our toes, pay extra attention to the signs. To listen.

Celine woke up at less than 100% optimal health and she listened to her body and took the morning swim off. In spite of the consistent wind, we made a plan for Alina and Simon to guide Miriam, Sam and Kendra on a full circumnavigation of Sandy Island, while Janet and I would swim up wind a little ways to the beach, walk the white sand, jump in at the beautiful reef, then cruise down hill back to the boat, wind and current at our backs.

We all jumped in and set off as planned. As Janet and I made our way toward the island, we took breaks for resting and adjusting caps and goggles. We chatted through these about the limits life can fool us into believing for ourselves. Hurdles, some thrust upon us and some of our own creation, that make the going bumpy. How our perception can trick us into thinking that something we want might be impossible. Face back down, swim some more, contemplate. Stop, goggles up, chat. I’ve had many swims like this with strangers who become friends. The stopping is often an automatic response to the recollection of the fears of yesterday. Many people need to chat through the process of shedding limits. I am happy to float, witness, listen.

And so Janet and I had a swim a little like this today. We shared personal stories, shed a few tears, laughed some, and made a lot of progress against the current. Before we knew it, we had made it all the way to the reef, no beach walk required to avoid the current’s pull. Once there, I found a perfect urchin skeleton I retrieved from the bottom, delicate and amazing. Janet is a woman of science and so I knew that she would appreciate the finer and fascinating aspects of phylum Echinodermata. She grasped pentamerous symmetry easily and was fascinated by the water vascular system as a means of transportation. I collected a living specimen and she marveled at feeling these processes at work in the palm of her hand. Janet sees the big picture of the universe easily, so I was grateful for an opportunity to give her an up close experience with a small, miraculous detail of the natural world. She got it. Harmony.

We let go and drifted home to the boat. As we rounded the corner of the stern, I took her hand to help her against the current and back to the ladder. As we reached it, she told me that this had been her longest continuous open water swim ever. She said she had exceeded her expectations for herself. 

What more could a guide want? 

Especially on a Wednesday.

Our shipmates, all SV alumni, had had a bouncy, sporty swim around the back side of the island and arrived at the boat just a few minutes before we did. Simon recorded some footage of their strong strokes. They all look so beautiful and strong in what I know was a chaotic and rough swim. Years of faith in Wednesdays apparent in each stroke.

We motor sailed just a little north to one of our favorite bays on Carriacou, Anse La Roche (Beach of the Rock). As the name implies, there’s a majestic rock promontory at the foot of the bay, dramatic in form above and below the sea surface. The underwater ledge is home to fleets of blue tang, striped grunts and countless chromis. Sea fans sway in the swell. It’s a short passage through another dimension. Kendra spent most of our swim here underwater.

This bay is also known for a fun little beach bar, approachable only by water. Celine and Sam tucked a little cash into a swim buoy and wandered up on the beach for a pina colada. It was that kind of swim - novel and real casual. It was our second swim before lunch and I think no one had designs on a lot of distance. There was bobbing and beach bar-ing and a staggered trickle of guests and guides returning to the boat.

Lunch was a largely asian affair with peanut noodles and broccoli. Everyone is napping now as we slowly sail south to the main dock at Hillsborough, Carriacou’s biggest little town. We’ll dingy in for a walk about, perhaps a soursop smoothie, maybe an ice cream while combing markets for snacks and trinkets found here and nowhere else.

A rare sighting of Ali out of the galley as we sail down to Hillsborough Town.

We are back from our outing in Hillsborough Town. I had business to do at Digicel (keeping our trips in internet is no easy task, believe me), and then I started walking around meeting people as I love to do. I met Marcia who was selling colorful bits of clothing outside the grocery store. Ali and I stumbled into a shop that had the parmesan she needed, then we found another store with bags and bags of coconuts outside. We went in and found they had FRESH coconut water, and we promptly bought 9 bottles to bring back to the boat. As we talked with the owner about the beautiful textiles we saw throughout her shop, it became clear that we could choose from the textiles in the shop and have seamstress Dayleen CUSTOM MAKE a one of a kind bag for each of us!! Ali and I were so excited and put our orders in. We can’t wait to pick them up when we come back here next week. 

We went to the ice cream shop and spoke with Naila who made us each a cone. I remembered her from last year and it was so good to see her again. 

I love meeting people who live in the places I visit and work. It always becomes clear to me that we have more in common than not. In my 5 visits to Carriacou, I have found the people here to be exceedingly kind and welcoming. 

When we got back aboard, our guests and crew seemed a little tighter than we started the day. Conversations were as easy as the breeze and laughter continues to fill the cockpit even as I finish this blog post. It seems the experiences of Wednesday have not only tipped us each to the better side of ourselves, but pulled us closer to one another. 

Love,

Heather