New Zealand - Lake Taupo is next

Now we look to our next swim which is completely different to any other we have done before.

Chris and myself along with Julie Bradshaw have put together two teams of six swimmers to swim a triple crossing of Lake Taupo on the North Island of New Zealand.
Lake Taupo is around 40.2 kilometers long therefore a similar distance to the English Channel, we expect to take over 30 hours to complete the swim which will be a world first, each swimmer swimming one hour at a time under the 'English Channel' rules.

Chris and I are arriving in New Zealand in time to see the New Year in, whilst other swimmers are arriving shortly after.
The swim is being coordinated by the great Philip Rush who organises the Cook Strait swims in NZ. Due to often unpredictable weather in NZ we have a swim 'window' of between the 3rd and the 8th of January 2009.

The swimmers on the two teams are;

Women's team;

Julie Bradshaw - England
Michelle Macy - USA
Barbara Pellick - Australia
Penny Palfrey - Australia
Heather Osborn - NZ
Lucy Roper - England


Mixed team;

Mark Cockroft - NZ
Dougal Hunt - Australia
Steve Junk - Australia
Chris Palfrey - Australia
Stephen Spence - Australia