After the success of Chill Swim just a few weeks ago, the Bluetits Chill Swimmers have been quite busy.

Deanna, Sian and Tracey met up with local photographer Mark Griffiths who is writing a book on Wales and how the landscape is being used now.

Mark photographed the ladies swimming from the harbour and across North Beach. The temperature was 8.9 degrees, so not too chilly!

Mark joined the Bluetits again up at Rosebush to photograph them swimming in the quarry. This time, Sian, Jemima, Penny, Lucy, Helen and Keith swam, while Ella, Tim and Tracey acted as support crew. This is an ideal place to cold water swim as the water is quite often below six degrees, something the sea doesn’t get to.

The weather that day was truly dreadful, with full on rain and wind blasting in from all directions, but that just added to the excitement of it and, of course, the photographs that Mark would take.

Mark’s book is called ‘Notes from the old country’ and is a photographic exploration of Wales and the people who inhabit it. Good luck with the book, Mark, and we hope to have a signed copy soon!

With the temperature drop, the last few weeks we have seen quite a bit of frost out there, with iced up cars in the mornings. This made all the Bluetits very excited indeed as this would make the water temperature drop quite rapidly.

One of those frosty mornings, Tracey got up to a particular hard frost and decided to try the Pembrokeshire ponds for a swim. The water temperature was a shocking 1.2 degrees, with ice covering most of the pond and Tracey having to break the ice to get into the water! The temperature drop was a shock to the system indeed, but it was beautiful, as when you swam, you were pushing the ice away with your hand. An awesome experience to remember!

The Bluetits’ latest event took Helen, Keith, Sian and Tracey down to the Cotswolds to do the Chilly Dippers event. Sian took on the 800 metres, while Helen and Tracey took on the 400 and Keith the 100-metre events. The course was laid out with buoy markers in a triangular shape of 400 metres, making the 800-metre event two laps.

The temperature of the lake on arrival was lower than what we were expecting, but absolutely delighted at a smack on five degrees, which is ice mile regulation temperatures. Again all the Bluetits did this event with no wetsuit, but just a swimsuit and cap.

Well done all for taking part and a hearty thank you to both Pat and Jason, the organisers of Chilly Dipper events, for making us all feel very welcome and having a good laugh at our group name. We intend to return next year!

A very well done to our resident Bluetit Jemima (aka Chubbs), who up until now has not been keen to get into the very cold water, but she impressed us all by earning her wings and getting into the quarry at 5.9 degrees... with a mermaid tail on, no less!

All the pictures and video from this can be found on our Facebook page.

As the water is starting to warm up, we will be hosting a wild swim event soon and invite anyone wanting to give this a try to come along. The emphasis will be on having fun, so if you fancy a little dip or want to swim for longer distances, you will have a warm welcome.

Please keep a lookout on the Facebook page for details or call either Sian in St. Davids on 07917006012 or Tracey in Tenby on 07772765839.