Robben Island stands as a symbol to the power and resilience of the human spirit. Long distance swimmers consider the swim between the mainland and the island as the ‘Everest” of South African open water swims.

The shortest distance for the crossing, from Robben Island to Big Bay, is 7.5 kms. However very few people swim it in a straight line so the distances are different for each individual … varying upwards of 7.5 kilometres.

By international open-water swimming standards, the Robben Island to Big Bay swim is considered relatively short, however, the difficulty of the swim is amplified by the cold water and the fact that a ‘true’ swim is executed without a wetsuit – commonly referred to doing the swim in ‘skins’.

A small group of NSRI volunteers will be undertaking this crossing to raise funds and awareness for the NSRI’s Water Safety Education & Survival Swimming programmes.

In South Africa 29% of fatal drownings are children younger than 14 years of age. Our Water Safety Education and Survival Swimming initiatives have the power to reduce these figures.

Since the inception of our Water Safety Education programme in 2006, over 3 200 000 children have been taught how to be safe in or near water, how to help a friend in difficulty in water without endangering themselves, and how to do bystander CPR.

Our Survival Swimming Programme teaches children the basic swimming skills and how to stay afloat should they find themselves out of their depth in water.

You can support this amazing group of volunteers, who not only serve on Sea Rescue boats as unpaid volunteer crew but are now going to tackle the Everest of South African open water swims to raise money for our drowning prevention programmes.