Written by: Lara du Plessis

The Swim

The infamous Robben Island Freedom swim is a 7.4km open water swim in the cold Atlantic waters of Cape Town, from Robben Island to Bloubergstrand. Emily Farrell and I decided earlier in the year to take on this challenge, and that we wanted to complete the crossing in bikinis (no wetsuits) to make it even more of a challenge. 12 weeks of training ensued, which involved many cold water ocean swims with our group from Cape Town Water Swim Co. as well as pool training sessions and strength training. We loved the journey leading up to the swim and made such great friends through our training group.

Open water swimming is unlike many other sport in the sense that you can’t truly know when you will complete a swim - there’s no predetermined date you get ready for. The ocean and mother nature (especially with all her South-Easter winds in Cape Town which bring in the icy water) are completely out of your control, which means the waiting game is a real rollercoaster when it comes to your swimming window period. The boats are booked for a week, and the aim is to swim the crossing on the best day in that week period. It was unfortunate for us that the South-Easter wind had been howling for two weeks leading up to our swim so we had to wait an extra week for the water temperature to warm up to at least 13 degrees - a temperature we knew we would be able to cross in and at least enjoy the swim in.

Those days of waiting and the uncertainty that came with it were some proper character building stuff, especially with everyone asking us when we were going to swim and why we hadn’t crossed yet because Cape Town’s weather was so perfect. Nonetheless, it was absolutely worth the wait. Emily and I set out on the morning of 12 April to make our way by boat to Robben Island from where we swam in crystal clear and super calm water all the way to Bloubergstrand. At a balmy 14 degrees, the cold water definitely hit us hard about 5km into the swim and the ending was really tough, but taking a breath and seeing Table Mountain in all her glory was a great distraction.

Knowing Your Why

We’ve all heard Simon Sinek’s mantra before - “Know your WHY”. This is the idea that if you know the purpose, the Why, behind what you are doing then it is so much more likely to be successful and impactful. Emily and I broke our swim into five 30-minute slots and devoted each half an hour of swimming to a special person of cause in our lives. Both of our first half an hours swum were devoted to Periods for Hope, the work the NPO does, and the beneficiaries of our work. Personally, knowing that I was doing this super challenging swim for a bigger purpose than myself, to raise fund for reusable sanitary products for underprivileged schoolgirls in South Africa, made all the training and the swim itself all the more worth it and helped me persevere when the going got tough.

The Fundraising

About a month before our planned week for the swim we launched our fundraising campaign to see if we could raise some money for Periods for Hope. And did we raise some money? Honestly, we were bowled over with how this campaign succeeded. We set out with a target of R12 000 - we wanted to raise enough money to fund 10 reusable sanitary kits per km that we swam, meaning we would help 74 girls. Nice target, but we smashed it out of the park within three days. Next up we decided to raise the target to R46 664 in honour of Nelson Mandela’s prison number during his imprisonment on Robben Island - this would mean we could fund 282 reusable sanitary kits. With a few days to go before the swim we reached that target and then the funding just kept rolling in. It was honestly so incredible to see people from all over the world and all levels of wealth donate to our campaign and support the work that Periods for Hope does.

Final amount raised: R77 600

〰️

Final amount raised: R77 600 〰️

Now the real work begins

The funding raised from this campaign is going towards the collaboration that Periods for Hope is currently working on with another NPO called CoolPlay. CoolPlay’s mission is to “To create meaningful change in underprivileged communities. To develop resilience and the necessary skills to empower learners to cope with life’s challenges and become positive agents of change.” They focus on doing this through the medium of sports coaching and sports groups where there are mentors, known as “champions'' who facilitate weekly group sessions for young students in a multitude of areas around the Western Cape. On the 21st of May CoolPlay will be hosting a Netball Day where the Periods for Hope team will educate the Champions on topics surrounding menstrual and sexual health, teen pregnancy and gender-based violence in a format that the Champions will be able to pass this education onto their students in a valuable and sustainable way. The Periods for Hope team will also be donating reusable pads to all the girls in the CoolPlay program (400 girls) so they no longer have to worry about the lack of sanitary products and will never need to miss school due to period poverty.

Co-founders swim from Robben Island to Blouberg in bikinis to take a stand against period poverty