Monday 6:30pm EST 50:47 Swim time
A Pod Of Dolphins
If there were ever a moment during the Nyad swim when Diana was grateful to the NRDC and all organizations that support pristine waters -- and there have been many of those moments during this 2012 expedition -- the best one came at 6:30 p.m. today (Monday) when she was visited by dolphins! There were scores of them; around our boat, alone, one team member counted 50 playing in the wake, while another looked up to see dozens more leaping above the water. We could even hear them breathing all around us. (They sounded like The Nyad swimming.) Dolphins have swum with Diana many times over the years, especially in the 1960s and '70s when the open waters of the world, both fresh and ocean, were cleaner than now.
Photo: Gunnar Schrade
Swim hats off to all those who work for the preservation of where beauty lives -- and even visits us! -- in the form of these intelligent beings. Laughing with joy at the sight and sound of them, someone on the deck declared, "Diana loves dolphins!"
Is that you Diana? Detail of a Nereis riding a dolphin. ca. 425BCE via Theoi Project
"Diana is one herself," Gunnar Schrade replied. And thank you, NRDC, from Diana Nyad and all of us, for the support you've provided for her expedition of discovery and celebration. (BTW, Diana wanted us to ask you, NRDC, "Did you send the dolphins, too?")
-- Candace Hogan aboard Quest
Help the NRDC protect dolphins and other cetaceans from explosive noise from oil and gas exploration, which threatens whales with hearing loss, injury and death.