Polar Bear Swim Day

Polar Bear Swimming Day, or Polar Bear Riding Day, is an annual day dedicated to polar bear riding, where participants step into cold waters as a part of a challenge or for purposes charity. Although polar bear ramps take place during the colder months, the most common day for them is New Year's Day, making it fitting that today will be Polar Bear Swim Day. If the ice-cold water challenge can be done on New Year's Day, then it will be easier to overcome many other challenges throughout the year.

The History of Polar Bear Swim Day

Polar Bear Swimming Day has been practiced for over a hundred years in different countries. The first recorded Polar Bear swimming took place in Boston in 1904. In many Canadian communities, plunging into icy waters to swim is a New Year custom. Vancouver's annual Polar Bear swimming club has been in operation since 1920 and typically has 1,000 to 2,000 new registrars each New Year's Day with a record 2,128 registrations to the polar bear in the British Gulf in 2000.

It seems that the Netherlands has far outstripped North America, as around 10,000 people have dived into the chilly seawaters in Scheveningen, the main Dutch beach resort town, every year since 1960. Actually, it is estimated that 30,000 Dutch participate in this holiday every year.

Although New Year's Day is the best day for swimming, because as many participants noted, after you have done that, there is no challenge for the New Year can bring for you. However, some swimming clubs hold regular winter lessons. Plungapalooza, at Sandy Point State Park in Maryland, is the biggest polar bear plunge in the United States.

The Special Olympics fundraising event has raised millions of dollars. The largest plungapalooza so far took place in 2008, with an estimated 12,000 participants.

How to Observe Polar Bear Swim Day

It is actually quite simple: Let take part in! Find the nearest Polar Bear Swimming Day and register. You can help raise money for people who need it, meet new friends and make some incredible memories! However, you should remember that humans do not have the fat and fur like polar bears to protect them from the cold.

Get in the water slowly so you do not get too shocked, and be sure to have towels and dry clothes ready as soon as you get out of the water. You should also warm up and then from the inside out with a hot drink or a bowl of soup. Polar Bear swimming is also not suitable for everyone, as it causes many intense body reactions - you can start breathing fast because you cannot take a deep breath for the first 30 seconds or longer, simultaneously your heart and blood pressure will probably go up drastically.

Therefore, if you have heart disease or have a tendency to panic, you had better stand on the shore in a nice warm coat, hat and scarf, take pictures and laugh at people who are running right up out of the water as fast as possible. They ran into it. Either way, you will be able to be a part of the fun!