Q&A with Pat Gallant-Charette - One Maine swimmer took the challenge of a lifetime

A lifelong Westbrook resident, Pat Gallant-
Charette, 57, trained for three years to be
the first grandmother in Maine to complete
the 20.7-mile swim of the English Channel,
from England to France. Gallant-Charette, who
works as a registered nurse at the Barron
Center in Portland, worked to acclimate
herself to cold water all winter for the event,
which she started at the end of July. She swam
for 16 hours, and came to within two miles of
France. But she had to get back on the boat
that was following her because the currents
were too strong. Reporter Leslie Bridges talked
with Gallant-Charette both before she left for
England and after she returned home. Here are
excerpts from those two interviews:

Q. How long have you been training?

A. I have 10 years of
training in long distance swimming,
but I started picking up my pace about
three years ago. I trained all last year
in the ocean until the last day of November.
I stopped when the water temperature
got to 46 degrees. Now, it's like bath
water to me 57, 58 degrees. Most swimmers
who fail, fail because of hypothermia.

Q. Why did you decide to try to
swim the English Channel?

A. My husband, Jim, was the one who
really encouraged me. He knows my passion
for swimming. This will be my eighth year
in a row swimming the Peaks to Portland.
I did the Great Chesapeake Bay, but that
was a shorter one, only 4.4 miles. I swam
from Alcatraz to the main land, which was
a fun one. That was 1.25 miles. I'm kind
of a veteran distance
swimmer.

Q. How did you get into long-distance
swimming?

A. I come from a large family. About 10
years ago, one of my brothers died from a
heart attack. He went to Northeastern, and
he was an outstanding swimmer. His
death was devastating to my family. It was
just very, very painful. At the time, my son
said he'd like to do the Peaks to Portland
in honor of his uncle, Robbie. I said, I wish
I could do it with you, and he said, You
could if you tried. So, four days a week, I'd
go to Davan Pool and do my hour of swimming.

Doing the Peaks to Portland was such
a great feeling the camaraderie between
swimmers and at the end of the finish line
was my brother's son, who was 4. I realized
it was something I really loved.

Q. Other than train for the distance
and getting used to the cold, what else
did you have to do to prepare?

A. To qualify for the English Channel,
I had to swim six hours in water under
60 degrees. My son Tom was a coach for
a competitive swim team, and he officiated
my time. I had to register with the
Channel Swimming Association and send
them my medical records. I had to have
an EKG. They're very strict.

Q. What kind of things did you do
to acclimate yourself to the cold?

A. During the winter, I wouldn't use heat
in the car. My poor husband our bedroom
was ice cold.

The very first time I went into 60 degree
water my teeth were chattering. I did what
they said, stayed in for five minutes, then
10 minutes. Pretty soon, I could go into
water in the high 40s and it wouldn't
bother me. They recommend to fill
up your tub and put bags of ice in it. I just
filled it right up, and my daughter, Sarah,
would sit with me and chat and monitor
my temperature. It's an amazing process,
what the human body can go through.

Q. What was the hardest part
about the channel swim?

A. What I didn't prepare for was the
taste of the water. It tasted like someone
mixed a quarter-cup of salt water with a
quarter-cup of chalk and a teaspoon of
acid. It burned my mouth. When I finished
the swim I had ulcers in my mouth,
and my tongue had a white coating that
peeled off. It was very, very sore. And
I got friction burns on my arms from the
salt water, but I was expecting that.

Q. Did you encounter any sea creatures
during your swim?

A. I got stung by two jellyfish in the first
10 minutes of the swim. Then at night,
when all I could see was total black, my
hand entered the water and I saw this
silvery thing grab onto my arm with its
mouth. It didn't have any teeth. I continued
with the stroke I never missed a beat
and the fish flew above me, did a flip
in the air and landed on my neck. At first I
was thinking, I hope this isn't a shark, but
I didn't feel any pain. I was like, You're not
going to stop me from reaching France. The
fish was OK.

Q. Was it hard being in cold water for
that long?

A.I had really good conditions. The water
temperature was very warm, in the mid
60s. I thought it was like bath water, but I
heard they were pulling people for hypothermia.
They hand off drinks to you from
the boat, and I got so hot I asked for ice in
my water. Word got back to Dover, and
one of the locals, David Frantzefkou,
said he's never heard of that in the history
of the English Channel. He said, This is
going to be all over Dover.

Q. How did you feel at the end of the
swim?

A. I wasn't even tired. The English Channel
official said I had the endurance to do
a double crossing. She said she thought I
could have gone back, and I agree. I swam
in place for four hours before they pulled
me. I didn't want to get out. I swore like
a pirate, but the boat captain makes the
final decision.

Q. How do you feel about it now that
you're home?