€6k raised by young girl’s charity swim

A young Belturbet girl has raised close to €6,000 after swimming over 1,000 metres daily in open water for 15 days.

Kirsty McCaul (12) from Belturbet raised almost €5,000 alone online on a GoFundMe page appeal, which concludes this coming weekend.

Kirsty picked three charities- Cavan General Paediatric Unit, Crumlin Children's Hospital, and Down Syndrome Cavan - to benefit from her endeavour.

The primary school pupil had initially intended to swim just 500 metres a day at her local Annagh Lake, but ended up doing double that with support from her mum Nathalie, an active member of the Annagh Lake Dippers swim group.

Amazingly, Kirsty only began swimming at the lake last summer but bravely continued right through winter and is now swimming without her wetsuit.

The sum raised to date has smashed the initial goal of €500 Kirsty had first hoped to achieve, welcoming donations from generous supporters from as far afield as the UK, Australia, and America.

Mum Nathalie says the McCauls have been blown away by the response to Kirsty’s challenge.

People called to our home, stopped us in the street, whilst out walking and gave money from their cars and stopped us in the supermarket also. It created a feel-good factor with so many people and it was a humbling experience all round.”

She adds that Kirsty’s success has served as an inspiration to others people who perhaps had wanted to take to the lake for some time themselves.

“Kirsty feels extremely happy with how everything went and is delighted her chosen charities will benefit from the extreme generosity that everyone has shown. This is an experience that Kirsty says will be forever etched in her memory for all the right reasons.”