Supporters are invited to welcome Ridler and his crew at the Bay of Islands Yacht Club, with Deep Sea Conservation Coalition’s Karli Thomas speaking on seamounts and the impacts of bottom trawling.
Bay of Islands – here comes Jono Ridler and Swim4TheOcean
By Live Ocean
12/01/2026
Read time: 3 min
Article Summary
Main Points
Jono Ridler logged another 25km today, bringing his total to 138.7km, and confirmed the first community stopover at Waitangi at 3pm on Tuesday 13 January.
Starting at 8am tomorrow, Ridler will undertake a six-hour swim towards Nine Pin near the Bay of Islands before transferring ashore for the stopover.
Jono Ridler made great progress south today, announcing the first community stopover for 3pm Tuesday 13 January as a result. He logged another 25kms today – and now has 138.7km under the belt.
One more push tomorrow morning will bring him close to Nine Pin on the outer entrance to the Bay of Islands – the plan is to start at 8am for a six-hour leg.
Rather than swim from Nine Pin into Waitangi, adding time and kms to his monumental world-record staged swim attempt, Ridler will travel from his last marked GPS point to the Bay of Islands Yacht Club for the community stopover.
Public are encouraged to welcome Ridler and his support crew ashore and will have the opportunity to shake hands and grab a selfie.
Karli Thomas, Deep Sea Conservation Coalition will be at the community stopover – sharing her specialist knowledge on underwater mountains (seamounts) and the damage caused by bottom trawling. People can show their support for the call to end bottom trawling – already more than 2,500 have signed.
Today’s first swim
Starting out early – at 6:15am Ridler tracked southwards towards Motueka Flat Island where he swam through the narrow gap between the island and mainland passing over water shallow enough for him to see the rocky reef below. After three hours in, and good progress he completed leg one off Matauri Bay.
Time: 3 hours
Distance: 9.2km
Speed: 3.07km/hour
Today’s second swim
After a rest ashore Ridler got underway again just before 5pm passing through inside the Cavalli Islands where conditions glassed off before a south-westerly breeze filled in – current pushing his track offshore slightly – looking to take a straight line towards the outer entrance of the Bay of Islands tomorrow morning.
Time: 4 hours 21 mins
Distance: 16.2km
Speed: 3.72km/hour
Tomorrow morning Ridler will return to the marked waypoint and get under at around 8am for a long swim shift planned ahead of the first community stopover at Waitangi. Rather than swim all the way into the Bay of Islands – which would add hours to his swim time – Ridler will transfer ashore in the Swim4TheOcean StabiX support boat to connect with locals.
Conditions
Sea state: Calm
Weather: Sunny and mild with light northerly breeze
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