Three-week push begins as Liv Mackay joins Swim4TheOcean

After two days weather forced him ashore in Napier, Jono Ridler has set his sights on the final stretch of Swim4TheOcean, telling the crew he’d like to reach Wellington within three weeks.

“My goal, what I want to try and achieve, and obviously there are factors outside of our control, like weather and currents and the like. But I’d like to land this in three weeks,” he said.

“That means every single day doing some really hard stuff.

“And just remind me of that as well, that this is short term, and I asked for this, and that it’s all building on getting to our final destination. It’s going to be a hard push, so let’s look after each other and get it done.”

The renewed push comes as the weather window reopened after a southerly front kept Jono and the Swim4TheOcean crew ashore in Napier on 14 and 15 March.

“We seem to have about a five-day window of some really good swimming conditions, so we’re gonna just try to hightail it down the coast as far as possible,” said On-Water Safety Lead Ben Goffin.

With that window opening, the crew transited out from Napier aboard the StabiX to the last marked GPS point. Jono was back in the water just after 7am for the first of two planned swims.

The opening stint ran through until 11am and logged more than 11km, indicating a strong pace of around 3.2km/h.

Jumping in, Jono called back to the boat that it “feels like 25 degrees”. In reality the water temperature has dropped to 17.4°C – a noticeable shift from the warmer waters he started in at Waikuku Beach North Cape on 5 January.

“It actually felt quite nice. It felt kind of warm in a way, so my body’s adapting quite well,” he said.

“There wasn’t a lot of wind around, so the conditions were pretty epic, and I had some dolphins first thing getting into the water.”

Now beyond Te Kauwae-a-Māui Cape Kidnappers, the team are tracking further south down the Hawke’s Bay coastline.

Coming ashore for a break between swims at Waimārama, the crew took a moment to chat with local kids taking part in an event at the surf club before heading back out for the afternoon session.

Joining Jono in the water was special guest Liv Mackay, Black Foils athlete who grew up in Hawke’s Bay and learned to sail at Napier Sailing Club.

“He’s saying that the water temperature’s dropping as he obviously gets further south, so it might be a bit chilly – so it’s questionable how long I’m going to last out there – but I’m super excited,” she said.

The two first met on another ocean adventure, and she describes how she fared swimming with him that day;

“I met Jono on another epic mission when we were out looking for manta rays in the Hauraki Gulf. We got in the water there as well to swim with manta rays, which was an unreal experience. He dropped me within 10 seconds, so we’ll see how we get on today.”

Asked what she thought when she first heard about Swim4TheOcean, Mackay said the scale of the effort was immediately obvious.

“It definitely confirmed that he’s absolutely crazy, but I just thought it was unreal. I’ve seen his other missions before and how much attention that’s brought to some serious issues, so I think it’s incredibly admirable and I’m inspired by him.”

Jono returned to the water at 2:30pm for a five-hour push, swimming through until 7:30pm.

The second stint added another 15.2km, bringing the day’s tally to more than 26km across nine hours in the ocean.

Public support for the mission continues to build, with more than 29,000 people now having signed the Swim4TheOcean call for action to asking for a move away from destructive bottom trawling.

Follow Jono’s progress on the live tracker and sign the call for action at Swim4TheOcean.

Projected distance to go: 332.1km
Total distance covered: 1055.4km

Swim at a glance – 15 March

Swim 1
Time: 3 hours 59 mins
Distance: 11.25km
Average speed: 3.2km/h

Swim 2
Time: 5 hours  
Distance: 15.52km
Average speed: 3.1km/h