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After walking Western Australia's 3000-kilometre-long Rabbit Proof Fence in 2016, Lindsey Cole went looking for her next adventure — swimming England's most famous river in a mermaid suit to raise awareness of plastic pollution.
The British adventurer threw herself into a life of adventure after her father died, taking her across the globe in a bid to find unique, inspiring experiences.
The idea to swim the Thames came to the young adventurer when she was freediving in Bali.
"I felt a sting to my hand and thought it was a jellyfish," she said.
"I looked closely and it was this clear piece of plastic and it cut my hand.
"I turned around and I was surrounded by these little pieces of plastic bobbing around, three miles from shore and it was pretty shocking."
It was then she decided to swim 200 kilometres down the River Thames in a monofin, collecting plastic and spreading the message along the way.
"Monofinning is a discipline of freediving so I though I would swim the River Thames as a mermaid," she said.
"It would be quite visual and people would ask us what we were doing and it would raise awareness of plastic pollution."
She was accompanied by her friend, Barbara, who created a mermaid sculpture out of the plastic bottles and wrappers they found.
An adventure for a cause
Swimming the Thames was just one of the many unique experiences Ms Cole could tick off her bucket list.
In 2017, she hitchhiked around Australia with truck drivers to find out their original tales on the road, all while documenting the experience on social media.
She has also rollerskated to Paris while learning French, ran 250 kilometres in Manchester while playing the ukulele, and ran from Wales to London to visit a friend for a cup of tea.
But her most inspiring adventure was following the footsteps of Molly, Daisy and Grace who ran away from a government settlement near Perth in 1931 and followed the Rabbit Proof Fence to their home in Jigalong.
She said swimming the Thames was a totally different challenge.
"The Rabbit Proof Fence was remarkable, magical and just wonderful … it was inspiring," she said.
"I did it on my own, I was out there for three months. Other than the homesteads I stayed with, I did not really come across anyone.
"But while mermaiding the Thames I had my friend beside me 24/7 and in the evening we were staying with hosts, so from the minute I woke up and went to bed my head was sort of active and occupied so it was really exhausting."
She said the experience was worth it, because she was able to raise awareness of Britain's pollution problem.
"We found more plastic than we could fill the mermaid [sculpture] with," she said.
"In some areas it was pretty good, areas where there might be a stand-up paddle board club or canoe club people really love and respect their river so they often do clean-ups.
"But on the edge of cities like Oxford or Redding it was pretty bad and stagnant, I would go over and try and pick stuff up in the reeds, and the water was so still and the smell would just reached down into the pit of my stomach."
Making a splash for change
Ms Cole said she had already seen positive change in reducing the world's plastic footprint.
"We just hope that people use less plastic," she said.
"People are getting better because the government in Britain is planning to ban some single-use plastics.
"But we want people to be more conscious of what they buy, so when they go shopping, you know, take a reusable bag and do not put loose vegetables in one of those plastic bags.
"We do not need to buy plastic bottles of water because our water is so good."
"People also need to be more conscious about throwing stuff away, ordinarily if something is broken we just chuck it away but decades ago our grandparents would never chuck stuff away, they would fix it and make it last forever."
Topics: environment, environmental-impact, plastics-and-rubber, pollution-disasters-and-safety, water-pollution, pollution, swimming, extreme-sports, community-and-society, regional, geraldton-6530, wa, united-kingdom, england