The Hauck family displays the Puerto Rican flag at the beach
in Dover
before undertaking their channel swim. Standing, from left, Jason,
Harry
Jr., Harry Sr., Tim, sitting Caroll, Krista.
Channel swims not for
the faint
hearted By HARRY
HAUCK
Harry Hauck, the long-distance
swimmer who swam
from St. Thomas to Puerto Rico and then, with his family, swam the
English
Channel, will in May of 1988 swim around Puerto Rico . The
round-the-island
swim is part of a two-week long celebration of Hogares Crea's 20th
anniversary,
called a "Crusade of Faith and Hope" to signify the importance of the
anti-drug
campaign. To help publicize the celebration and show how grueling a
long-distance
swim can be, Hauck has lent us the diary of the family swim across the
Channel. The italicized paragraphs that follow are from his diary,
explanations
are in regular type.
-
Shakespeare Beach, Dover, England
9:30 a.m., Sunday, Aug. 31, 1986
The other channel swimmers have
already
left the beach, but Tim is still greasing himself. He seems nervous.
I've
never seen him like this before. I put him first on the family relay
because
he is our best "blue water" swimmer. His hesitation comes as a
surprise.
If he doesn't get into the water and start swimming immediately, we'll
miss the 10:30 outgoing tide.
When I called at 7 a.m., Reginald
Brickell, our
charter guide-boat captain, told me the sea had dropped to a "Force 3
or
3 1/2" (1 is flat calm, 10 is a hurricane). This is the best it has
been
since Hurricane Charlie wiped out our original go-date, on Aug. 26.
Brickell
said all signs were good, and that we should make our run at history
today,
since he couldn't guarantee that the weather would hold much longer.
-
10:30 a.m. First swimmer: Timothy
Tim is now alongside the boat, 42
minutes
into his first leg of the relay. He is doing well, about 64 strokes a
minute.
He hasn't shown any signs of the anxiety that I observed in him earlier.
When I gave the rest of the clan the news that we were on
go, I found
them apprehensive but ready to get on with it. The sitting around
waiting
for good weather had been hard on everyone's' nerves. Due to the delay
we were running out of time and money.
-
Harry Jr., just shouted something
to Tim and
he responded by giving his brother the OK sign with his thumb and
forefinger.
Guess the cold hasn't gotten to him yet. I think he's more sure of
himself
now.
The couple who manage the British Sailors Society Mission
took us over
to Folkestone in their mini-van. Folkestone Harbor, where the charter
boats
are kept, is 12 miles from Dover. The cook at the hotel had made up
several
dozen sandwiches and filled two large thermoses with black coffee and
hot
chocolate. As we unloaded, the family seemed a little edgy with one
another
undoubtedly feeling the pressure of the upcoming swim. We transferred
all
our gear: food, blankets, warm clothes, channel grease, cameras,
personal
medications, etc., from the dock to a small inflatable dinghy, then to
the escort vessel, a 50-foot North Sea fishing trawler, named the Helen
Ann-Marie. My daughter-in-law is named Anne-Marie, so I took this as a
good omen. (Page 2)
|