My Wakatipu Legendary Swimmer

Saturday 22 March

Up stupidly early for the Wakatipu Legend Swim - left the campsite at 5.50am to gather on the beach in Queenstown by 6.30… still in the darkness.

We walked across to the quay and gathered for the briefing before all the swimmers boarded the TSS Earnslaw to be ferried 4km across the lake where they had to jump off the boat then on the sound of the horn, swim back to the beach. Utter madness!

We got chatting with a couple from Brisbane who were a little concerned that the lake temperature was around 15*C - they were used to swimming in Queensland temperatures, not Queenstown, more like 25*C. I was impressed with their orange sleeved wetsuits, which matched Louis' strappy cap - I think he should get one as he'd be much easier to spot in a race!.

The Earnslaw set sail into the darkness at around 7.00am taking all the swimmers round to the Frankton Arm of Lake Wakatipu where they had to jump in and mill around waiting for a water start at 8.00am. Meanwhile I had time to kill so had a chat with the Grandad of Pooches, the most recalcitrant blonde Goldie I have ever met! He was not happy that Mum & Dad had gone off on the boat without him and literally had to be physically manhandled off the wharf; later at the beach he stood in the water up to his knees, shivering but refusing point blank to move until Grandad dragged him back up the beach - what a character

I had a wander around the harbour as the night's darkness slipped away, the sunrise turning the sky a myriad shades of purple, red, pink, orange & gold as it popped up over the hills to the East - stunning. Just by the beach I spotted a bunch of available parking meters so wandered back through the park, past more fit people gathering for the morning's Park Run, to move the Pajero up closer to town.

Waiting on the beach and chatting with other supporters, we were also treated to the classic sight of the TSS Earnslaw coming round the peninsula, turning straight towards us before turning and berthing at the dock again - just beautiful. She really is a stunning craft.

The winner was an Aucklander, young Alex Dunkley - but not far behind him in 12th place (out of 120ish people) came our Louis! Awesome swim! Second in his age group and about 4th or 5th of the pink cap swimmers - those doing just the 4km swim. Strangely there were a bunch of (mainly young) swimmers who were wearing red caps as they were doing the Triple Challenge and going back in for a 2km swim and a 1km swim within the hour! Louis lay have looked like a red capper - but only because he lost his pink cap on the peninsula and was wearing his fluro orange strappy cap!

We stopped for breakfast in town then headed back to Banjo to chill, snooze, make onward plans and catch up with some blogging. I went for a wee walk by the Frankton shoreline of the lake and met a gorgeous Goldie puppy called Poppy.

We had planned to cycle into town but it started raining and I’d just done my hair in the lovely facilities block so we drove back in, paid another fortune in parking and had a delicious dinner at Finz - to celebrate both Louis’ amazing swim and 100 days on the road on Banjo’s Odyssey! Wow, how that time has flown!

The menu at Finz was rather too appealing - we struggled to choose our favourites - started with delicious calamari, then Louis had mussels with creamy wine sauce and I had seafood spaghetti (clams, prawns, baby octopus & capers - yum!) then we closed with sticky date pudding - #manykilos!