At 60, swimming friends beat 60km goal for rivers

Pair raise funds to save EL’s Gonubie estuary

Two 60-year-old Eastern Cape open water swimming friends, Joy Roach and Mandy Uys, have swum 70km in seven days, traversing the Gonubie, Karatara/Swartvlei, Knysna, Kromme, Kariega, Kowie, Kleinemonde and Keiskamma rivers.

Supported by their crew, swimmer friends Barbara Briceland and Gail Wild, both 67, as well as family, friends and the community along the way, they completed their swim on Saturday March 16 in the Keiskamma estuary in Hamburg.

When they turned 50 in 2013, the pair started a ritual to swim at least the same distance as their age each decade, to celebrate life, friendship, and the health to still be able to enjoy swimming.

For their 50th birthdays, they each swam 25km in one day, off the coast of Mahe Island in the Seychelles, supported by family and friends on boats alongside them.

This year, the pair turned their focus to local rivers and estuaries in an attempt to raise awareness of the need to protect and manage the few that remain in good condition, and to start restoration of those that have been badly degraded.

To celebrate their 60th birthdays, they decided to swim 60km in six estuaries over six days, from March 10 to 16.

As it turned out, they swam 70km over seven days.

Passionate daily ocean and estuary swimmers, they chose some of the estuaries that are still in a relatively healthy and swimmable condition in SA.

Their plan was to use the swim to raise awareness of SA’s beautiful estuaries, their rapid and preventable degradation, and the urgent need to protect them.

They started their swim in East London, their home, on March 7, with a 5km swim in the Gonubie River.

Their swim was also a fundraiser for the development of an Estuary Management Plan (EMP) for the Gonubie River.

It is the only truly clean river in the city and is one of the few that has an ecological status of “B” (lightly transformed).

It is still widely used by swimmers, paddlers, boaters and anglers. Over the past year, the estuary, like many in SA, has been exposed to regular spills of raw sewage during loadshedding due to underequipped or dysfunctional pump stations.

An EMP is the first step towards ensuring some protection for the system.

The friends partnered with the Gonubie Estuary Management (GEM) community and were supported by the NPO Swim for Rivers, and by the provincial department of economic development, environmental affairs and tourism, which is the controlling authority.

The fundraising goal is R300,000, with R14,400 raised from the swim.

The team were sponsored fuel for the journey by Astron Beacon Bay, and received a start-up donation towards the EMP from Western Gruppe Properties.

The EMP will provide the community of East London with a means of ensuring the management and protection of the estuary into the future.

The South African Integrated

Coastal Management Act states that all estuaries in SA must be managed in a coordinated and efficient way.

All estuaries are required to have an EMP. The format for this is outlined in the National Estuarine Management Protocol.

The development of an EMP includes: a professional scientific situation assessment of the estuary; the development of a management plan for the estuary; approval and adoption of the management plan by the MEC; gazetting of the final EMP.

It is then a legal instrument to use for the management of the system.

While the EMP should be organised and funded by the relevant controlling authority, funds are short, and many communities have had to raise funds on their own to have these plans written up and gazetted.

Donate to the fundraiser to: Account: Nedbank A/C 115 295 0487. Ref: ‘GEM_Your Name’. Email EFT to drmandyuys@gmail.com.

Find them on Facebook: Wild n Free for the Estuary

See picture on page 10.