Ten club members set of for this event. Hayley,Dale and Dave Clarke came along to offer help and support.
Our first venture into the river was to gain confidence and experience moving around in the current on slippery rocks. This made you realise how easy it could be to trap your feet even in shallow water. Then onto defensive and offensive swimming in current and how to cross into eddies. This gave you confidence for what was to come through the day.
Next how to use a throw line trying different lengths and bags and how to retrieve the line and throw again if you missed the first time. A lot of lines went higher in the air than across the river to start with but slowly we all found our preferred method of throw. Now the big test one person in water one throwing. Getting your line in the correct place to rescue a swimmer is difficult,but as they say practise makes perfect (well almost). We then moved on to reading the features on a river.
This was a new experience for me and probably a few more also but very informative. A chance then to try swimming in some of these features to gain more confidence as they do look quite daunting for the first time.After lunch how to rescue pinned boats using lines and simple to tie knots.
Followed by how to cross a river in twos,threes and fours. Then using lines to across the the river. A quick swim/ float down river through a weir onto learning how to defend yourself when passive swimming using your feet.
A lot to remember but a brilliant day and great confidence booster.Many thanks to Alister for making this a fun and informative day which if you haven’t been on is a must.
Thanks also to Alice, Kat, Neil, Dave, Ross, Mark, Martin, Micheal, Hayley, Dale, Dave and not forgetting Phil for the transport.
Great way to meet club members and have a fun day.
