David Jones is not crazy. Nor does he have a death wish. He just likes to do wacky stuff on his birthdays, like his 51st, when he swam a 7-mile stretch of the lower Hillsborough River, from the Lowry Park Boat Ramp to Jackson's on Harbour Island. There, he and his compadres — three kayakers and a guy manning a small motorboat — stopped in for a few post-jaunt beers.
Twelve days after his swim, the obvious question is: How do you feel?
"I feel great," he says with a laugh. "I didn't want to get too cocky for at least a week, just in case a microbe got me."
He's pretty sure he's in the clear.
Jones didn't just dive into the Hillsborough. He did some research first.
"I came up with all the objections I could think of not to do it," he says," assessed all the risks and answered them one at a time. My two major ones were behemoths and microbes."
As in … big alligators that could eat him and little organisms that could make him sick. He ruled out being chomped on after kayaking the river several times to see where the gators were, and how big. His accompanying flotilla was there in part to ward off attacking reptiles if necessary. As for the microbes, he called the Hillsborough County Environmental Protection Agency, which told him reassuring things. "Then when I said I was going to swim in it, I could hear them gulp and groan," Jones says. "They told me that as long as my immune system wasn't compromised, I'd probably be OK. That was good enough for me."
Jones and company took off at 11 a.m. on Thurs., April 17 into a rising tide. So how was it? Disgusting? "I'm not recommending that anyone do this, but as far as water quality, I loved it," Jones says. "The tannins made it like ice tea, but I could see my fingertips clearly when I stroked. What little I tasted of it was fine."
At mile 5, Jones — who lives in Temple Terrace and owns a manufacturing rep firm in the RV industry — told one of his wingmen to call Rick's on the River and have them bring four mugs of room-temperature beer down to the dock. The group stopped, downed their brews and continued on.
Jones' swim took about four and a half hours. He found it so rewarding that he next plans to swim the entire river. It won't be on his birthday, though. Jones figures he'll do it in the "the dead of winter. Hopefully, the reptiles will be asleep."
This article appears in May 7-13, 2008.