Swimming to Antarctica_ Tales of a Long-Distance Swimmer - Lynne Cox [58]
For more than four hours, John Sonnichsen had been shouting at me, using a bullhorn pressed against his mouth. Sonnichsen had offered to come to New Zealand as my adviser. I was getting into new territory now, and in this case, I was attempting a swim that a dozen people had tried but only three men from New Zealand had completed. Because Sonnichsen had experience setting up swims in areas that had rarely been swum, figuring out tides and currents, my folks had agreed to pay him and to send him with me to help on the swim, and also to be my chaperon. By profession, Sonnichsen was a physical education teacher in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, and he had a wife and three daughters. He was a good guy, but that bullhorn was driving me crazy. He had been shouting at me all morning long. I wanted to tear that bullhorn out of his hands and throw it into the ocean.
Sonnichsen had just informed me that the tide had swept us back around the tip of the North Island and we had been steadily going backward for the past two hours. He hadn’t wanted to tell me because he’d thought I would be discouraged. Oh, he was right; I was.
When I looked up to breathe, to confirm what he had just told me, off to my right side was the North Island, and I could see our starting point, jutting out ahead of us by three or four miles. When I lifted my head straight up, to see where the South Island should have been, all I saw in the distance was haze, and a sea of waves and heavy winds. It was impossible to think of continuing through it; I was exhausted. So was the crew.
Accompanying me on paddleboards were lifeguards from the Island Bay Surf Lifesaving Club. They had been battling against the sea with me all morning long. And on the two boats ahead of us were Sam Moses, a journalist from Sports Illustrated; Keith Hancox, a radio announcer and one of the three men who had swum the strait; Sandy Blewett; John Cataldo, the head pilot; and his fishing crew. Some of the crew were getting seasick and were having difficulty standing without tumbling over.
For more than five hours, I thought, I’ve been swimming across Cook Strait and no one told me I’ve been going backward most of this time? It occurred to me that something might be wrong, but I had no idea how wrong.
Most of New Zealand knew what obstacles we would have to overcome; Keith Hancox had been broadcasting our progress—and lack of it—hourly over Radio Wellington, a local station on the North Island. More than anyone, Hancox knew what Cook Strait was all about. He knew how incredibly tough the crossing could be from a swimmer’s perspective, and he informed his listeners that I was really struggling. His listeners understood and related to it. Because Cook Strait separates the North and South Islands of New Zealand, most residents had crossed the strait by ferry.
New Zealanders knew how terribly rough Cook Strait could be, and they got caught up in the story. Every hour they stopped whatever they were doing for an update. They told Hancox over the ship’s radio that they were as caught up in listening to the broadcast as they had been the day Neil Armstrong had walked on the moon. It was as if, one by one, people lit a million candles. Throughout New Zealand people turned on their radios, and interest grew so quickly that Radio Wellington canceled its normal programming and went to live national coverage. News stations from around the world had their reporters tune in.
New Zealand was, after all,