Coral Beach - Day 1 - Saturday 22nd October

Woke up at a hideous hour; 7-00 A.M! Little did we know what the following days would bring. Breakfast was a veritable spectacle, a melody of all the delights one could ever wish for at the breakfast table. Then training. The less said about that the better! We survived, although with alarmingly vivid tan lines which we have been working hard to eradicate through several hours of inertia on sunbeds. However, after several hours of toil we then decided to explore the depths of the sea. There was sand, rocks, seaweed and, despite the claims of one of the younger members of the camp, NO JELLYFISH! More training followed, quite unnecessary in our view; we'd spent ages in the water already! Dinner was also yummy - parents need not worry about their child not having enough food, believe me. Bedtime next, where we all went to bed RIGHT AWAY AND DIDN'T STAY UP AT ALL, ready to wake up and face another day of sun, sea and sand (and training).

Love from all the girls.

Coral Beach - Day 2 - Sunday 23rd October

Sunday, Day 208 of training. Everyone woke up at the ungodly hour of 6-30 a.m. and slowly crawled to the pool. The legend Jamie "Big J" Stewart awaited our presence for a long hard set. Chris was punished for turning up late and was forced to complete the 15 X 200 IM set in a frilly purple hat. After the session it was all to much for Ben who spent the rest of the day asleep and missed out on the fun that was to come:

Sunbathing (again);
Swimming in the sea (Tom and James beat Jamie in a race!); and
Swimming in the leisure pool.

After a day of fun, training seemed like such a drag but Big J taught us some good techniques.

Dinner followed a night of relaxation and sleep ready for Monday...

Coral Beach - Day 3 - Monday 24th October

The day started dismally 6-45 A.M. was a burden on all our shoulders and the main set was even worse! 36 50s Max PB + 5 seconds with a swim and rest of 1:30. This was certainly a tiring set and we all felt the pain of the lactic acid at the end.

Luckily, the day was improved by an interesting game of volleyball. It started off fairly slowly but by the end (with the exception of one or two of the girls who were keen to avoid the ball!) we were all thoroughly enjoying ourselves.

Lunch was the normal ham and cheese baguette, but was still fine.

After lunch we did another stroke specific training set. This time it was front crawl. We did various different drills and it was, overall, an enjoyable session thanks to our coach Big J.

Throughout the day the weather remained disappointingly overcast, a let down after the experience of the previous days.

To conclude, the day was a mixed day as the sets were hard, but it was also enjoyable because of the Group activities.

Coral Beach - Day 4 - Tuesday 25th October

On Tuesday morning we woke up at about 6-00 a.m. and went down to the pool for morning training. When we got there Jamie was waiting for us and once everyone had arrived we started land training - skipping and stretches.

The main set was very hard, it was 30 X 100m! After training everyone was very tired and we went to relax and mess about on the beach. In summary to all this I think everyone enjoyed the day but still found it hard. We all had fun on the beach so in the end it turned out as a good enjoyable day, as the rest of the camp has been.

Jon, James (S), Will and Alex.

Coral Beach - Day 5 - Wednesday 26th October

Once again the swimmers woke up to 2 and a half hours of Jamie's so called easy sets. This was closely followed by yet another breakfast of donuts, waffles, pancakes and sausages.

The mood was good as we were off to the water park, the journey was interesting the bus was not red and had air conditioning that worked. The driver deemed it necessary to overtake the cars in front.

The water park itself was amazing, huge rides that you actually get airborne on and the lifeguards were kind enough to let us do what we wanted to. On the last slide we had almost everyone going together extremely fast.

It was an epic day.

James B & Will E

Coral Beach - Day 6 - Thursday 27th October

Another early start - 06-45; and time trials this morning, after all that training!

Still, after that was over it was a relaxed morning at the beach/by the poolside and in the afternoon it was the banana boats or the crazy settee - see the photos!

After that our last training session, following which Big J found himself in the pool.

The swimmers and adults highlights of the week were:

• A fantastic talk and question and answer session by the British Paralympic team;
• Feeling the warmth of the sun as it rose over the morning training session;
• Swimming to the Buoy for the first time;
• Swimming in the sea;
• The water park;
• The hotel;
• Rosie walking into the glass doors;
• Everything James B said;
• Going down the slides at the water park as a group;
• Chilling out;
• Beating Jamie in a race;
• Counting down the sessions;
• Chris' magic fountain;
• The Crazy Couch;
• James B falling through the patio doors onto the balcony;
• Free time;
• Getting to know everyone;
• Watching the Crazy Couch;
• Lying in the sun; and
• Everything!

All in all, a fantastic camp and the swimmers were generally very well behaved - we couldn't have asked for a better bunch.

Gill, Carmen, Jamie and Ed