Like thousands of other playful swimmers around the world, the die-hard ocean swimmers in Orange County, California put a special twist on their weekly swim this week due to Halloween.

Their colleagues in the State of Washington will be doing a social swim to Cutts Island in Gig Harbor: a Survivor/Adventurer Theme Party. They will start off with an hour-long Fire-Making contest, using just wood and string, no matches or flints, ala Bear Grylls to see who can get their spindle smoldering the soonest.

In keeping with the Survival/Adventurer theme, the winner will get an autographed copy of Lynne Cox’s newest book “South With the Sun”, a historical account of Polar Exploration. They then swim out to Cutts Island.

After the swim, the participants are encouraged to run or walk immediately upon exiting the water to help ease the transition while vasoconstriction ends and vasodilation begins as the swimmers start on a short trail run course laid out through the woods nearby (a Run-Through-The-Woods-To-Stay-Warm). At various places there will be candy bars; collect all 6 different types and this qualifies you to enter to win a planter full of Tulip bulbs.

All this sounds like great fun.

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