Feel the fear and swim it anyway

The sea swimming phenomenon was a bandwagon too far, thought this landlubbing writer... until she learned to take the plunge in Waterford

Liadan Hynes at her regular spot on the Bull Wall in Clontarf

Liadán Hynes

‘You’d better get in. I’m going to be unbearably smug about this later,” I say to my companion as we stand on the diving platform beside our swimming teacher, Ronan O’Connor. We’ve just had a lesson in the swimming pool at the Cliff House Hotel in Ardmore – and now we’re outside for the slightly less controlled, much colder second part – sea swimming.

My seven-year-old had looked at me sceptically a few days earlier when I told her about the trip. “Can you swim, Mommy?”