Wild Swim
£14.99In this full-colour guide, Kate Rew, founder of the Outdoor Swimming Society, takes the reader on a wild journey through Britain, covering 200 rivers, lakes, tidal pools, lidos, estuaries and sea swims.
Showing 13–21 of 21 resultsSorted by latest
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At the Pond: Swimming at the Hampstead Ladies’ Pond
£9.99Tucked away along a shady path towards the north-east edge of Hampstead Heath is a sign: Women Only. This is the Kenwood Ladies’ Bathing Pond. Officially opened to the public in 1925, it is the only wild swimming spot in the UK that is reserved for women. Created centuries ago, the Heath’s chain of ponds are one of the sources of the River Fleet that runs subterraneously through London. Swimming in the Ladies’ Pond’s green, silty, silky waters, it’s hard to avoid the feeling that you are moving through history and outside of time.
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Lido: The feel-good debut of the year
£8.99Rosemary has lived in Brixton all her life. But now everything she knows is changing – the library where she used to work has closed, the family fruit and veg shop has become a trendy bar, and her beloved husband George is gone. Kate has just moved and feels alone in a city that is too big for her. She’s at the bottom rung of her career as a journalist on a local paper, and is determined to make something of it. So when the local lido is threatened with closure, Kate knows this story could be her chance to shine. And Rosemary knows it is the end of everything for her. Together they are determined to make a stand, to show that the pool is more than just a place to swim – it is the heart of the community. Together they will show the importance of friendship, the value of community, and how ordinary people can protect the things they love.
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Boy In The Water
£14.99Eltham, South London. 1984: the warm fug of the swimming pool and the slow splashing of a boy learning to swim but not yet wanting to take his foot off the bottom. Fast-forward four years. Photographers and family wait on the shingle beach as a boy in a bright orange hat and grease-smeared goggles swims the last few metres from France to England. He has been in the water for twelve agonising hours, encouraged at each stroke by his coach, John Bullet, who has become a second father. This is the story of a remarkable friendship between a coach and a boy, and a love letter to the intensity and freedom of childhood.
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I Found My Tribe
£8.99Ruth’s tribe are her lively children and her filmmaker husband, Simon, who has Motor Neurone Disease and can only communicate with his eyes. Ruth’s other ‘tribe’ are the friends who gather at the cove in Greystones, Co. Wicklow, and regularly throw themselves into the freezing cold water, just for kicks. ‘The Tragic Wives’ Swimming Club’, as they jokingly call themselves, meet to cope with the extreme challenges life puts in their way, not to mention the monster waves rolling over the horizon. Swimming is just one of the daily coping strategies as Ruth fights to preserve the strong but now silent connection with her husband. As she tells the story of their marriage, via diagnosis to their current precarious situation, Ruth also charts her passion for sea swimming – culminating in a midnight swim under the full moon on her wedding anniversary.
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Swell
£8.99These days, swimming may seem like the most egalitarian of pastimes, open to anyone with a swimsuit – but this wasn’t always the case. In the 19th century, swimming was exclusively the domain of men, and access to pools was a luxury limited by class. Women were (barely) allowed to swim in the sea, as long as no men were around, but even into the 20th century they could be arrested and fined if they dared dive into a lake. It wasn’t until the 1930s that women were finally, and reluctantly, granted equal access. This is the story of the women who made that possible, a thank-you to the fearless ‘swimming suffragettes’ who took on the status quo, fought for equal access, and won.
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I Found My Tribe
£14.99Ruth’s tribe are her lively children and her filmmaker husband, Simon, who has Motor Neurone Disease and can only communicate with his eyes. Ruth’s other ‘tribe’ are the friends who gather at the cove in Greystones, Co. Wicklow, and regularly throw themselves into the freezing cold water, just for kicks. An invocation to all of us to love as hard as we can, and live even harder, ‘I Found My Tribe’ is an urgent and uplifting letter to a husband, family, friends, the natural world and the brightness of life.
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Swell
£16.99These days, swimming may seem like the most egalitarian of pastimes, open to anyone with a swimsuit – but this wasn’t always the case. In the 19th century, swimming was exclusively the domain of men, and access to pools was a luxury limited by class. Women were (barely) allowed to swim in the sea, as long as no men were around, but even into the 20th century they could be arrested and fined if they dared dive into a lake. It wasn’t until the 1930s that women were finally, and reluctantly, granted equal access. This is the story of the women who made that possible, a thank-you to the fearless ‘swimming suffragettes’ who took on the status quo, fought for equal access, and won.