Women Who Travel Podcast: Author Freya Bromley Talks Wild Swimming, Cornwall, and Puffin Encounters

LA: Is there much swimming in it? How much does that activity play a role? It is winter, but by your standards that shouldn’t get in the way.

FB: Yeah. Exactly. I think swimming is wonderful in a story for really pushing your characters out of their comfort zone, and what better way to do it than by plunging into water? There’s a metaphor there for a reason about jumping straight in, right?

LA: We are knee-deep in summer right now, and hopefully everyone listening has managed to seek out some sort of body of water if they’re in the Northern Hemisphere or the South, given that I went into a Peruvian lake recently. If the idea of wild swimming has them intrigued, what are your tips for finding bodies of water to I’m going to say dive right into?

FB: What are my tips? I think definitely seek out local groups. If you’re in the UK there’s an organization called the Bluetits, which you can look up. They have swimming groups all over the country, but I know that there’s groups everywhere around the world. It’s a really great way to meet friends. Even if you just turn up to a beach or a pool or a pond on the weekend, you’re guaranteed to find people. My parents live in Wales in the UK, and there’s some mountains there of the Brecon Beacons. If you go to Keepers Pond, which is a mountain pool, every Saturday it’s full of people swimming whatever the weather. Definitely seek out connection, go when other people may be around, and be ready with something to share. It’s amazing to have a conversation starter when you go swimming.

I like to bring a flask of coffee, maybe some cake. See if you can swap your cake for someone else’s coffee. But as well as being a nice way to meet people, it’s also really good for safety. If you have a bit of a shock or if things are too cold for you, it’s great to have somebody who’s out there looking after you. One of my top tips is I like to be able to press my forefinger against my thumb. If I feel like my hands are beginning to claw or cramp up, then maybe it’s time for me to get out. I also have some little neoprene booties. I don’t know if you have those either, but they help keep my feet warm. Especially because I usually stand in the shallows thinking about whether I’m going to get in for quite a while, so it’s good for my toes to be cozy.

LA: That’s a good point. I torture myself when I’m getting into cold water rather than just ripping the plaster off and jumping in. Do you drag it out, it sounds like?

FB: I’m the same. I’m not very assertive. My partner’s great. He gets straight in no messing about, but I need everybody to do a countdown for me.

LA: That’s really reassuring because I also… I’m just a wimp, but clearly not. Freya, thank you so much for coming back on and sharing more stories of wild swimming. If people want to follow along with your travels and your writing and even pre-order your book when that comes about, where can they find you on the internet?

FB: I’d be so happy if they could pre-order my book. You can find me on Instagram @freybromley where you can find details of my writing there. But you can also find me on Condé Nast Traveler occasionally writing about the restorative power of nature and women’s travel.

LA: Thank you for listening to Women Who Travel. I’m Lale Arikoglu, and you can find me on Instagram @lalehannah. Our engineer is Pran Bandi. Special thanks to Jake Lummus for engineering support. Our show is mixed by Amar Lal at Macrosound. Jude Kampfner is our producer, Stephanie Kariuki, our executive producer, and Chris Bannon is head of Condé Nast Global Audio.