This past weekend I went for my first open water swim in a while, probably in a year or two. I loved it! The cool water and the ability to swim with no end, I feel like I could just keeping going forever. There is no noise, no email, nothing but me and the water. 

So why, if I love it so much, have I not done it for so long? Honestly, the period of time from 2020 – 2023 (which will remain nameless) was a tough period for me and I struggled mentally. I was stuck. I feel better now, much better and have been in search of… something. I wasn’t sure what that something was but I knew it was an event, a goal, a challenge that I needed to push me. 

A couple of weeks ago I saw a Facebook post and I knew the second that I read it that it was EXACTLY what I have been looking for. I saw the post on a Friday and registration didn’t open until Monday and I was bouncing off the walls excited all weekend! I knew that I was looking for something but I had no idea how much I needed it. 

Throughout my life I have done many running & swimming events that were amazing – marathons, Ragnar Relays, 3.8K swims, a swimming vacation in Arizona. I could have signed up for one of those again but knew that wasn’t going to fulfill me. I needed a new EPIC adventure.

Get your mind so eager, so zestful, so filled with interests that you cannot be tired ~ Dr. Norman Vincent Peale

On August 23rd, 2025 I will be swimming in the 15th Stage of the Edmund Fitzgerald Memorial Swim.

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of this historic maritime tragedy and to pay tribute to the 29 lost mariners, I will be swimming as a part of a 17-stage, 411-mile relay swim from the point where the Edmund Fitzgerald lies in Lake Superior to Detroit.  68 swimmers (and crew) will symbolically complete the intended route and cargo delivery that the ship was tragically unable to complete on that fateful night 50 years ago, by passing between us iron ore pellets from the same dock in Superior, Wisconsin, where the “Big Fitz” took on its last load.

In Stage 15 I, along with my 3 teammates will be swimming 17 miles in Lake Huron from Lexington to Port Huron, Michigan. The four of us will be swimming the 17 miles as a relay, rotating swimmers every 30 minutes.

I am VERY excited for this event on many different levels. 

First, and most importantly, it is a honour to be part of this event, to be able to remember and pay tribute to the mariners. We heard stories and listened to Gordon Lightfoot sing about the tragedy in elementary school. To be part of this one time event is incredible.

The physical challenge of this event is something that I need both physically and mentally. I need something to work towards. I need something to push me.

And finally, the Great Lakes have always been an important part of my life – I spent the first 3 months of my life (and every summer since) in Grand Bend, ON which is just across Lake Huron from where I will be swimming. I spent summers in high school going to a cottage on Lake Erie. I started my open water swimming career with LOST (Lake Ontario Swim Team) in Oakville, ON. And for the past 10 years, I have lived in Cobourg, ON, a fantastic town on the shores of Lake Ontario.

In addition to being a very important (and cool) event, this swim is also a fundraiser to preserve the Whitefish Point Lighthouse, an important beacon for all vessels entering or leaving Lake Superior since 1849, and the oldest operating lighthouse on the lake.  In a most unfortunate irony, the lighthouse went dark due to a power outage and was no help to the Edmund Fitzgerald the night she lost her radar and ultimately lost her battle to the raging storm. Maintaining the Whitefish Point Lighthouse helps safeguard mariners along Lake Superior’s “Shipwreck Coast.”

If you are interested in helping me with my fundraising goal you can do so through this link. (To my Canadian friends and family – please note that this is in USD.)

The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
The lake, it is said, never gives up her dead
When the skies of November turn gloomy
With a load of iron ore twenty-six thousand tons more
Than the Edmund Fitzgerald weighed empty
That good ship and true was a bone to be chewed
When the gales of November came early

The ship was the pride of the American side
Coming back from some mill in Wisconsin
As the big freighters go, it was bigger than most
With a crew and good captain well seasoned
Concluding some terms with a couple of steel firms
When they left fully loaded for Cleveland
And later that night when the ship’s bell rang
Could it be the north wind they’d been feelin’?

The wind in the wires made a tattle-tale sound
And a wave broke over the railing
And every man knew, as the captain did too
T’was the witch of November come stealin’
The dawn came late and the breakfast had to wait
When the gales of November came slashin’
When afternoon came it was freezin’ rain
In the face of a hurricane west wind

When suppertime came, the old cook came on deck sayin’
“Fellas, it’s too rough to feed ya”
At 7 PM, a main hatchway caved in, he said
“Fellas, it’s been good to know ya”
The captain wired in he had water comin’ in
And the good ship and crew was in peril
And later that night when his lights went outta sight
Came the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald

Does any one know where the love of God goes
When the waves turn the minutes to hours?
The searchers all say they’d have made Whitefish Bay
If they’d put fifteen more miles behind her
They might have split up or they might have capsized
They may have broke deep and took water
And all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the wives and the sons and the daughters

Lake Huron rolls, Superior sings
In the rooms of her ice-water mansion
Old Michigan steams like a young man’s dreams
The islands and bays are for sportsmen
And farther below Lake Ontario
Takes in what Lake Erie can send her
And the iron boats go as the mariners all know
With the gales of November remembered

In a musty old hall in Detroit they prayed
In the maritime sailors’ cathedral
The church bell chimed ’til it rang twenty-nine times
For each man on the Edmund Fitzgerald
The legend lives on from the Chippewa on down
Of the big lake they call Gitche Gumee
Superior, they said, never gives up her dead
When the gales of November come early