Cameron Bellamy is a South African born swimmer who just finished a long-distance swim from Barbados to St Lucia in the Caribbean.
St Lucia, Caribbean – Cameron Bellamy goes extreme for Africa! He recently swam 151km from the island of Barbados to the island of St Lucia. This is the longest channel swim to be undertaken, and Cameron did it in 56 hours and 36 minutes. The swim has never been attempted by anyone before so for Cameron to succeed, is an exciting thing!
He set off on his swim from St Peters Bay in Barbados at 8:20 am on Friday (the 13th of September) morning and arrived on the St Lucia beach just before 5:00 pm on Sunday. Even the St Lucia Mayor joined the crowd on the beach to welcome Cameron.
He was incredibly lucky as the sea was flat and calm and the weather very warm. Cameron planned the entire swim himself, making sure every aspect was covered before taking to the sea. He covered his body in a zinc solution to protect his skin from the sun and salty water.
Something we didn’t even consider was a possibility, ‘salt mouth’ was a big concern for Cameron. He paused his swim every hour to coat his mouth, lips and tongue in Vaseline as well as rinsed it out with mouth wash.
Cameron loves taking part in endurance challenges like this and does it all to raise money for charity.
“Cameron raises funds through the Ubunye Challenge, a charity he founded in 2011. Ubunye means “Unity” in Xhosa, the local Eastern Cape language where Ubunye does most of its work.
Ubunye’s mission is to support and enable some of the poorest and most underdeveloped rural areas of South Africa, Zimbabwe and, more recently, the Caribbean.
Growing up relatively privileged in Cape Town, South Africa, Cameron was cognizant of the fact that many children his age all over South Africa did not attend school. This memory led to his founding the charity in 2011 and using his athletic feats to raise funds to fulfil its mission.”
You can learn more about the charities he supports on his website here.
by 