AFTER A JOURNEY that spanned five months and 17 days, 27-year-old Daragh Morgan has become the first person to complete a tidal-assisted swim around the coast of the island of Ireland.

Morgan, aided by his small team, began the swim in May after years of preparation, hoping to be the first person to complete the undertaking and secure the world record. Initially, the team had hoped the swim would be wrapped up within four months.

This was not the case.

Morgan spoke to The Journal back in June when he had the first 100km of the swim under his belt, and this week, with the swim done and dusted, he reflected on the time since.

The 1,468km swim was not without its challenges – at one stage Morgan ended up being assessed at the plastic surgery unit at St James’s Hospital due to holes in his arms caused by his wetsuit chafing – and the operational costs and inclement weather hindered the challenge further.

“We did it on a shoestring, really,” Morgan told The Journal. “No one really believed in us. We had no corporate sponsorship at all, so we really relied on people donating to support the operational costs, which we tried to keep at an absolute minimum.”

Morgan spent 338 hours in the water, covering an average of 15km per day and swimming for approximately four hours daily across 99 separate swims over 93 days. 

Asked what the main factor slowing down the operation was, Morgan said: “Weather, injuries, pretty much anything you can think of, really.”

The journey was too long to plan as a whole, so they took it in quarters. “My first goal was to reach Malin Head, and once we did that – which was extremely difficult because you’ve the likes of the Donegal Bay crossing and other crossings that were so challenging – we then reached Malin Head and got some fantastic tides.

“We got around the east coast, and there were a lot of challenges there. We were dealt with thousands of lion’s mane jellyfish, colder water, periods of slack tides and bad injuries,” he said.

The swim came to an end this week at the Cliffs of Moher.

“Finishing was just so sweet,” Morgan said. “After everything we’ve been through, and all the hardship. I finished with Captain Dara Bailey, and without him, none of this would’ve been possible.”

He said the swim is just the “tip of the iceberg” of the whole experience and commended all who had made the journey with him and dealt with the logistics and physical efforts.

After taking the necessary steps to record the swim, Morgan and the team are hoping to have the expedition officially recognised by Guinness World Records as a world record in the coming weeks.

Over the course of the swim, funds were raised for the Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI) and the Simon Community. 

A homecoming will take place in Galway this evening at 4:30pm on the Galway Docks for Morgan and the crew.