Wednesday 27 Dec 2017 – B&B Anniversary Day

December 27 has been a fixture on Manly’s social calendar for the past 9 years – its the Bold and Beautiful anniversary

Who better than Julie, the charismatic founder, can put into words the beginning of B&B and the journey it has taken since:

9 years ago, who would have thought:

Having breakfast with Jenny Knapman at Tavita’s, offering to take her for a swim at 7am the following morning…. that that could have been the birth of the life changing phenomenon that B&B literally exploded into. From Jenny asking a couple of girl friends to join her for that first morning swim, to the ever evolving ‘group of friends’ going for the daily ritual morning swim.

Pink caps, hoodies, Christmas parties, winter and summer badges, marine life experiences, life long friendships, visitors from overseas who include Manly on their tour just to experience a swim with B&B, to a reason for locals, or not always so local (as some of our regulars travel a good hour or more for their swim), to get out of bed in the morning.  The list of benefits are endless.  The number of swimmers is literally mind blowing: over 16,000 unique swimmers with commonly a couple of hundred on any given morning and collectively we have never missed a swim in 9 amazingly wonderful years.

Whilst all this wonder has evolved, the fundamental hasn’t changed:

A truly inclusive group of friends going for a swim together, enjoying each other and looking out for each other.

Amazing what a little grain at breakfast can blossom into thanks to the good nature and bucket load of hard work of some of our fellow swimmer

 

Jenny and some of her friends, who started on 27 Dec 2008, today (27 Dec 2017)

Another anniversary, which passed silently, is Ann’s 8th anniversary swimming with B&B. From humble start, she has become a regular swimmer and worked her way up into the upper echelons of B&B management

John Bond, another key member of B&B (John, where is the smile on your face, you didn’t get enough Christmas presents?)

 

Lots of newbies today (32 in total), keeping the registration team busy (Ann, Henrietta)

 

 

Some fellow bloggers enjoyed their day off from blog-duty

 

 

 

Not exactly an anniversary, but a moment I still remember today: my first B&B swim with my kids Marco and Sonia, then 13 and 12, a bit over five years ago

 

then (2012 – here only with Sonia)

 

and now (2017).

At the beginning, they were eager to come for a swim, highlight being the ticking off their names on the manual attendance sheets. Unfortunately,  their enthusiasm did not last long, as they realised that it wasn’t cool to swim with us oldies. For the following 2 – 3 years, I could occasionally incentivise them with $10 pocket money for each B&B swim, until they got completely immune against this form of bribery. To my big surprise and joy, they offered to join me for a post Christmas swim, as a kind of Christmas present to me. Not that they really swam with me, as I can’t follow their pace, but it was nice nonetheless.

 

 

Pre-swim chat – always very social (Michael, John, Sam demonstrating their skills in fine conversation)

 

 

 

Into the water

 

 

 

 

 

 

and a late-comer (did you sleep in today, Gayle?)

 

Big crowd today again (348 swimmers), I guess a lot of us overindulged over Christmas and now have that little guilt feeling

Ann, chief conductor of the B&B choir, overseeing the B&B Happy Birthday song

 

Happy faces at Shelly

 

 

 

and preparation for the return swim to Manly

 

 

Enjoy and have a nice day

Bernhard

 

Stats:

Water: 21.1

Newbies: 32

Total: 348

Visibility: average – good

 

Bold and Beautiful is owned and operated by Bold and Beautiful Swim Squad Pty Ltd.