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Three wetsuited swimmers front-crawling in a line, each towing an orange float

Islay

Great Islay Swim

July 2017

In July 2017, Amanda Fornal joined the expedition team for the Great Islay Swim, a multi-day open-water expedition around Islay, Scotland. Swimmers Justin Fornal, Chad Anderson, and Johnnie Mundell completed the circumnavigation on 29 July 2017. The swim was the first circumnavigational swim of the island.

The expedition combined open-water swimming with historical, environmental, architectural, and whisky-related documentation. It was inspired by Alfred Barnard’s late-nineteenth-century survey of distilleries, published in The Whisky Distilleries of the United Kingdom. The team visited all eight distilleries operating on Islay at the time and expanded the historical record through video, photography, field observations, and sample collection.

Throughout the expedition, the swimmers carried the official flag of The Explorers Club United Kingdom Chapter. Sea captain Gus Newman of Islay Sea Adventures helped the team navigate changing weather, tides, and coastal conditions. Kayak crews provided route support, safety monitoring, and food for the swimmers.

Conditions included large swells along Islay’s northern coast, opposing wind and tide in the southeast, and strong currents through the Sound of Islay.

Field Documentation and Research

The expedition’s land team collected water, peat, and barley samples associated with the island’s distilleries. A botanist collected local plant samples, while kayak teams documented marine flora and fauna encountered around the island.

Architectural historian James Sexton examined historic buildings and ruins along the route. Amanda Fornal’s photographic archive documents the expedition, its support crews, the island’s distilleries, whisky production, peat cutting, coastal landscapes, architecture, and historic sites.

The Explorer’s Cask

The expedition transported a 30-gallon oak cask and filled it incrementally with whisky from each of Islay’s eight operating distilleries.

The resulting blended malt became known as the Explorer’s Cask. It was offered through the independent bottler Single Cask Nation as a limited charity bottling benefiting the Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

Project Resources

Whitewashed distillery buildings with "ARDBEG" painted across a warehouse wall, seen from the sea
Turquoise water breaking into whitecaps below layered cliffs with small sea caves
Churning foam and standing waves in a fast tidal current beside a low rocky shore
Distant sailboat on the horizon beyond ranks of open-water swell
Thin waterfall dropping through a green gully to a pale stony beach
Dark cave mouths in pale coastal cliffs below rolling green moorland
Tilted pink and grey rock slabs along the shoreline under a heavy sky
The Ardbeg distillery and its pagoda roofs set against wooded hills across the water
Ruined stone castle on a grassy rock outcrop above the sea, a distillery warehouse behind it
Swimmers trailing orange tow floats while a kayaker escorts them past a rock stack
Hand tipping a whisky bottle over the sea, a thin stream falling from the neck
Two red kayaks flanking swimmers on wide silver water beneath a blank sky
Small boat offshore beyond a rocky, grass-covered stretch of coastline
Open metal doors of a distillery kiln furnace, a fibrous tuft on the grate
"LAPHROAIG" painted in tall black letters along a white waterside warehouse
Distillery still signed "Laphroaig Distillery, Spirit Still No 2, Contents 4,700 Litres"
Row of copper pot stills with heavy hinged inspection hatches
Round stone tower on a grassy clifftop above folded rock outcrops
Green clifftops and rocky headlands running out along a sunlit coast
Calm bay reflecting low sheds and cottages on a rocky green shore
Wooden washbacks hooped in green, lids closed, inside a distillery
Weathered washbacks receding toward a bright open doorway
Dark rock shelves dropping into turquoise water, hills faint on the horizon
Swimmers with orange tow floats followed by a kayak and an inflatable support boat
Photographer shooting with a long lens from a bank of yellow wildflowers, lighthouse beyond
Fishing boats moored around swimmers and a kayak crossing a bright harbour
Whitewashed cottages ringing a bay, mirrored in clear seaweed-strewn shallows
Stone obelisk standing on a green headland, seen from the water
Fractured sea cliff streaked with yellow lichen above dark water
Support boat alone on glittering open sea beneath a scatter of seabirds, in black and white
Moss-covered branches arching over a fern-filled woodland floor
Twisted trunks thick with moss in a damp coastal wood
Purple foxglove spikes flowering above a bank of bracken
Swimmers in wetsuits and hats greeted by support crew beside a boat
Cloud draped over a bare hill above a low green shoreline across grey water
Cut peat blocks stacked in a pile to dry on the moor
Lifting a fresh peat slab on a long-handled cutting spade
Boots and a fork beside a row of newly cut peats laid on the grass
Two peat-cutting tools crossed over a peat stack, a bottle of Laphroaig 10 at its base
Trench cut into a peat bank, exposing dark layers below the turf
Orange RNLI lifeboat at its mooring, "Lifeboats" lettered along the hull
Dark-backed gull dropping towards a red lifebuoy on a boat rail
Rounded peak with cloud on its shoulder rising beyond a grassy coast
Seabird lifting off from choppy water below a green hillside
Two kayakers paddling open water with low hills on the far shore
Swimmer in a wetsuit towing an orange float past a rocky, grass-topped shoreline
Two-person kayak escorting a swimmer beneath steep cliffs draped in green
Red kayak with two paddlers alongside a swimmer near a shingle beach
Low moorland coast and a cloud-topped ridge seen from the water
Kayakers in orange and blue drysuits following a swimmer through choppy grey sea
Bearded swimmer in an orange cap and goggles giving a thumbs-up from the water
Conical peak wrapped in cloud rising behind a low green coastline
Snorkeller in a hooded wetsuit and dive mask, carrying a second mask
Snorkeller and a swimmer with an orange float beside a kayak in flat grey water
Small inflatable support boat and a drifting orange buoy below a misty hillside
Shoreline warehouses lettered "BUNNAHABHAIN" above a pebble beach
Encrusted timber pilings, ladder and ropes under a pier, in black and white
Silhouetted crew in wetsuits hauling a large wooden cask over a sea wall
Cloud-draped hills across the sound, with seaweed-covered rocks in the foreground
Two rounded peaks under cloud and a small white lighthouse on the far shore
Seals hauled out on a seaweed-covered rock ledge at the water's edge
Four seals resting on kelp below a grassy, rocky shoreline
A seal's head breaking the surface of choppy grey-green water
Lichen-crusted boulders forming a low reef along the Islay coast
Rocky skerries and green hills under heavy rain clouds, seen from the water
A narrow channel running between low, grass-topped rocky islets
Three wetsuited swimmers front-crawling in a line, each towing an orange float
A rope-lashed oak cask riding on the bow of an inflatable boat, held by a crew member
A red kayak with two paddlers escorting a swimmer past offshore rocks
Kayak support crew flanked by swimmers, with Islay's hills and cliffs behind
Swimmers with tow floats passing a white distillery wall lettered "ARDBEG"
A crowd on a stone pier applauding as three swimmers come in
Black and white frame of a young piper smiling amid the shoreline gathering

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