Free-diving swimmer's skinny dip bid for cancer funds

Wellington, Apr 20 : A free-diving swimmer is planning to dive naked into all of Scotland's major lochs to raise money for breast cancer charities.

The 23-year-old Jackie Brown will swim around ten metres in all the lochs - including Loch Lomond and Loch Ness - to raise around 3000 pounds for breast cancer charities.

At each location, Brown will be photographed for a series of pictures to go on sale when she completes the task.

Brown, who lives in Barony Street, has already had a trial run for her intensive three-week charity swim in the summer by plunging into the freezing Duddingston Loch.

She got rid of her inhibitions and took the plunge, much to the surprise of a nature-lover who happened to be looking through his binoculars at the time.

But it was realising just how freezing Scottish waters are that gave Brown the biggest shock.

"As with all good ideas, it was thought up in the pub. I left Edinburgh to go home for a while last year and I said my biggest regret was not skinny dipping in the lochs, so it all stemmed from there," the Scotsman quoted her, as saying.

Brown, originally from the Australian city of Perth, is going to seek the advice of her doctor before embarking on the potentially dangerous swimathon.

She said: "I'll be careful about it and make sure I'm eating right and that I have lots of blankets with me. I've had my injections and I won't be putting my head under the water."

She will be starting her challenge in the Capital on July 7, then heading up north.

ANI