Downstream

in a swimming club and she
did races in south London,’
he explains. ‘She always
liked open water and lidos.
Most people don’t like
swimming outdoors, they like
swimming pools, they’re
clean and they like the
temperature.’ But his only
experience in the Thames had
been a dip on a summer’s day
in his twenties near Henley.
‘When I told people that I
was going to do it their eyes