Burgh Island, Porthtowan tidal pool, the Thames, the Wye and Flamborough head limestone caves: from tidal pools to upland tarns, lakes, rivers and lidos, to swim in the locations featured in Robson Green's Wild Swimming Adventure (ITV)and Wild Swimming with Alice Roberts (BBC4) buy Kate Rew's book Wild Swim.
"This is a wonderful - in the old sense of that term - and joyful romp of a book. Roger Deakin would have approved. Dive in." ROBERT MACFARLANE
"Her prose is perfect. Page after page she nails things. Will have you hunched on the sofa as if with a stash of love letters."
ANTONIA QUIRKE, THE NEW STATESMAN, 26 June 2008. Read more.
"A book in a noble tradition of nature writing, most recently kept alive by Richard Mabey, Roger Deakin and Robert MacFarlane'.
THE INDEPENDENT, Picture Book of the Week, 14th June
"The photographs in the book are particularly splendid: some have all the disarming beauty of great paintings...."
MAIL ON SUNDAY Book of the Week, 8 June 2008
"...reignite[s] that basic desire to run to the nearest riverbank, tear off all your clothes and jump in.... inspirational enough to keep you rooted to that armchair." SUNDAY TIMES, June 29 2008.
Read more reviews. Take a Look inside. Buy from Amazon. Also available in hardback.
- Wild Swim. River, Lake, Lido and Sea: The Best Places to Swim Outdoors In Britain (Guardian Books, £12.99). By Kate Rew with photographs by Dominick Tyler.
Outdoor swimmers need very little kit, but they do need a good hat.
The OSS Swimming hat is highly visible, to other swimmers and boats (remember, they won't be expecting you).
It's warm. A good hat made of silicon makes a surprising difference to your heat in the water, which is why our swimmer (pictured left) has chosen to wear it in a mountain river pool. Over autumn and winter a thick hat will prolong swims nicely and reduce the 'ice-cream head' effect of cold water.
Wear your OSS Swimming hat with pride.
THIS ITEM HAS NOW SOLD OUT!
The Thames is a river swimmers superhighway: if you start at the source, there are over 150 swimmable miles left to go.
In this unique guide for river swimming, Michael Worthington, one of the founding fathers of the OSS, gives you all you need to swim the length of the Thames 'as a 'collect all the stickers kind of project, rather than some Herculean task to be completed all at once'.
Read the review in the Financial Times.
Worthington identifies the entry and exit points in a book of preparatory notes that divide the river into 75 manageable sections - with with plenty of opportunities for a good lunch along the way.
It is set out as a log-book so you can record when and with whom you did each swim.
"The nice thing about river swimming is that you can swim a really long way without ever losing the security of the bank," says Worthington. "If you swim across a lake, there's always a point where you are a long way from land in both directions - but in a river, you are never far from the edge. There's also a strong sense of going somewhere, of travelling from A to B."
Our midnight-blue snowflake swimming hat.
A very popular item, as seen here at the OSS December Dip 2009.
Like our original Sky Blue hoodie, the Electric Blue hoodie is snuggly and warm. Great after a cold swim and while you might have gone years without having one, once you get one on it is quite difficult to take it off.
We've upgraded morally with this one too - not only is it made with low-impact dyes (better for the environment) but it's also Fairtrade organic cotton, which means it's made in a sustainable farming methods and no pesticides (cotton is the usually one of the highest pesticide-requiring crops which means it is not good for rivers).
New for Summer 2010! Hoodies with a 'vintage-style' OSS logo. We have these in both men's and women's styles(women's are shaped) in range of colours and sizes.
Note: The Women's Pink Hoodies zip up at the front, so the OSS Logo is on the back, as pictured Left. The Men's Green XL Hoodie, also pictured left, is larger than the Men's Black XXL Hoodie (no, we don't know why either!?).
Cosy as you like, in 100% fair trade, eco-friendly, organic cotton.
Customise babygrows, tshirts , bags, and anything else with the OSS logo. Just iron on to anything that can take the heat of a hot iron.
Available as a single red heart (shown left) with the lettering of the OSS logo cut-out of it so the colour of whatever you iron it on to will show through - (10cm x 10cm), more suitable for light-coloured fabrics.
Alternatively, as just the OSS Logo (bottom left, just visible) white lettering with no background, (as per the OSS hoodie) comes as a clear backing which is removed after you iron it on approximately 10cm x 6cm. Ideal for dark fabrics - choose which shape from the menu below.
As modelled by Dan Martin (who is due to swim the Atlantic in 2011) and friend. Our new OSS T-shirt.
100% fair trade, eco-friendly, organic cotton, with a 'vintage-style' logo.
LAST FEW IN STOCK!