A careers fair for school pupils around Folkestone took place at the Leas Cliff Hall this week.

Swimming the Hudson

A UNIVERSITY tutor has talked about the time he drunkenly swam the Hudson River in New York as a joke with friends after drinking.

The mile long Hudson at Sunset

Whilst living near the banks of Jersey in his mid 20s, Dan Irwin, of Ethelbert Road, Canterbury, attended a party across the river with friends where the alcohol was flowing and he was enjoying the Manhattan lifestyle. 

When leaving the party the former journalist noticed that he could see his house on the opposite side of the Hudson. 

One of his friends drunkenly thought it would be amusing to set a dare to swim home instead of taking the subway. 

The now 38-year-old remembers deciding that this would be a funny idea, unlike many of his friends and so decided that he would swim the mile and a half, leaving his valuables with those who didn’t want to join in.   

Mr Irwin said: “Most of my friends didn’t want to do it and even didn’t like us because we did it.  They thought we had died until they saw us on the horizon.

“We didn’t do it to save time or money, we were drunk and it seemed like it would be fun.”

The university tutor, who then went on to become a journalist for eight years, later decided to take voluntary redundancy and is now a tutor in journalism at Canterbury Christ Church University. 

He said: “I would like to move back to New York to either write or to teach.”  






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