The Blue Room

Meet the inspiring group of women who swim in the Yarra/Birrarung River. It’s a group held together through friendship, pursuing good health and a love of nature. This dipping pod started during Melbourne’s lockdowns.

The Glenorchy Memorial Pool closed three years ago, when the council ruled it was too dangerous. But the community fought back, launching a campaign to save it. The pool reopens on October 3, 2026 - after a $6.5m refurbishment. The Blue Room joined some community members for a 'soft' opening and a chat about what this pool means, and the value of communities fighting for what they want. Fe...

The Weedy Seadragons swim at Kingston Beach , south of Hobart every Saturday. In summer, some members swim from Kingston Beach to Blackmans Bay and back - about five kilometres. Harold Gatenby is one of the founders of the group, and he sat down with the Blue Room's Sabra Lane for a chat about the group, and about the addiction that is ocean swimming. Features: Harold Gatenby , founder of the...

This is family. Meet the Weedy Seadragons of Kingston Beach, where swimmers become buddies, form life-long friendships and many feel this tribe is family. The Blue Room speaks with some of the Weedy Seadragons to find out how they got into swimming, how they discovered the Weedys - and what this group means. This Tasmanian tribe is special too for the Blue Room host Sabra Lane , as it's her re...

The Blue Room's Sabra Lane joins artist & swimmer Catherine Stringer i n her studio for a chat about her art and swimming. An exhibition of Catherine's work is about to open - it's called Below and Beyond. Catherine is now 71 years old, she started swimming with tribes seven years ago - and started her working life as a doctor. Water is a big part of her art - we talk about that an...

Dr Vanessa Pirotta spends a lot of her time in The Blue Room , or what she calls our Blue Backyard. As a kid all she wanted to do was to become a dolphin trainer - she's now a whale scientist and become a regular contributor in the media, explaining science. Vanessa talks with t he Blue Room's Sabra Lane about her fascination with the ocean, whales and science. We also discuss the approaching 70th...

The Blue Room's Sabra Lane interviews marathon swimmer Joanne Norman on becoming the first Australian woman to complete the Oceans Seven Challenge. What makes Joanne's story truly remarkable is that she was bitten by a Cookiecutter shark on her first attempt at the Molokaʻi channel. She recovered and successfully swam it a year after the attack. What makes her tick, why did she start marat...

Pop divas and sisters Vika and Linda Bull have just been inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame , released a new album "Where do you come from", are currently on a national tour and have written a song for swimmers called "That's how I pray". The Blue Room host Sabra Lane interviews them both to talk about how the song came about, what swimming means to them and about their ca...

Dr Heather Massey is a marathon swimmer. She's also a researcher at the University of Portsmouth’s Extreme Environments research group in the UK. She's just recruited people for a study comparing cold water swimming with medication in treating depression. Heather joined the Blue Room's Sabra Lane for a chat about her marathon swims, the science of cold water immersion, after drop and f...

Australian author Tim Winton joins the Blue Room podcast host Sabra Lane for a long chat about his obsession with the ocean. Tim is admired the world-over for his salt water stories. Nearly all of his novels are love letters to the sea. As Tim says in his dedication in “Land's Edge" - For my family and for those who know that a bad day's fishing is always better than a good day's work. Tim says sw...

Join The Blue Room for an inspiring chat with Tasmanian swimmer Brett Stephenson as he recounts his journey to complete South Africa's renowned Freedom Swim . Brett shares what motivated him to take on the challenge, the emotions of swimming through waters steeped in history, and the special moments that made the experience so meaningful. Brett talks with podcast host Sabra Lane and takes us b...

Mark Sowerby is The Blue Room 's guest in this episode. Over a decade he swims the Ocean Seven, seven channels of water on five continents. The first channel ( The English Channel ) is achieved while he's at the helm of a successful start-up company. The rest of the channels become a form of therapy, recovering from the shock of a company going under which morph into the documentary 'D...

The Blue Room visits the 2026 Devil of a Swim , relocated this year from Bicheno to Coles Bay. Also visiting the tourist hotspot, the Coledale Oysters from NSW. The Oysters heard about the swim on the Blue Room in 2025 and made a pact to join this year's competition. Afterwards they joined podcast host and swimmer Sabra Lane for a special 'live' recording of the episode at Coles Bay to...

The Blue Room's guest is Alison Orme and what has become 'a highlight of her life'. What started as a simple invite to friends to swim in some of Sydney's spectacular ocean pools became something much bigger. From discovering Harbour pools, to Sydney's ocean pools, pools along the NSW coastline, lidos in the UK and soon pools in France. Alison tells t he Blue Room how this pass...

It's a question pod host Sabra Lane is often asked; how to you become confident to swim in the open water? The Blue Room joins the Kingston Beach Surf Life Saving club in Tasmania, as the ' Dragons Swim Pod' graduates. The club has run a 10-week program aimed at getting swimmers confident to swim in the ocean. We join the pod on their final graduation swim, and talk with the trainers a...

Five years ago, a group of women waded into the cold waters of Tasmania and found something much bigger than a swim. Meet the Kingston Beach Sea Hags: a bold, joyful community bound by saltwater, courage, and connection. This podcast dives beneath the surface of “just a bobble” to explore the magic of cold water, the rhythm of “chat-stroke,” and the quiet power of showing up for one another—again...

At just 20 years old, Miu Tanaka is balancing university life in Sydney with record-breaking achievements in marathon swimming. The elite open water swimmer has already secured a series of remarkable firsts in Australia’s most challenging aquatic challenges. Miu Tanaka is the first woman to complete the demanding swim from New Norfolk to Bruny Island in Tasmania. She also became the first woman to...

Brendan Cullen works on an outback sheep farm near Broken Hill in NSW. In 2015 he sought help at the local hospital, not knowing what was wrong with himself. He was diagnosed with severe depression. Also that same year, he watched his brother compete in an open-water swim and he thought; "I want some of that". But how do you train for marathon swims, like the English Channel, when you li...

Save Phillip Pool is a Canberra community group that's just had a big win. The ACT government has backed down on plans to replace a 50m outdoor pool with a 25m one. Canberra woman Sarah Ransom got in touch with The Blue Room about the long-fight to save the pool. The story is one of grit, courage and determination by a group of everyday Australians who persuaded the territory government to do...

The Blue Room is on tour visiting Victoria's Bellarine Peninsula during Christmas 2025. And what better way to experience the coast here than swim with the famous Salty Bitches? This is a tribe of fun, inspiring and brave women (mainly) who love celebrating life by dipping daily in the sea off Indented Head. This tribe's joined up with the local Indented Head yachting fraternity and won a...

The Blue Room is back for another season, to talk with swimmers and dippers about the joys of getting into the ocean. They're all inspiring stories, about overcoming challenges, setting personal goals to achieve, and finding awe in the sea. In this episode podcast co-founder Sabra Lane interviews Alyssa Seckinger-Crow who is a Tasmanian by choice. The 21 year old has just finished the Tasman Bridg...

Rob Brander is Dr Rip - he's a coastal scientist at the University of NSW in Sydney. He's been educating beachgoers and kids about the surf for more than 25 years. He's written "Dr Rip's Essential Beach Book" sharing his knowledge about beaches, sand, surf and rips. He is Australia's best known beach scientist, he has an AM for it - and the Blue Room's Sabra Lane talks with him about safety, his f...

A special episode of the Blue Room , recorded days after the terror attack at Bondi Beach. Three days after that, Bondi swim clubs held a swim circle - to remember the dead, pay tribute to those who saved lives - and reclaim their space. Swimmer Lulu Cooper from the Bondi Great White Swim club helped organise the event, and spoke with podcaster Sabra Lane about the day, and what the swim tribes me...

On Tasmania’s east coast, the Bluebottles of Spring Beach bring together courage, sass, fun, fitness, and a carefree spirit. Podcaster co-founders Sabra Lane and Julia Mansour join the gang for a swim and find an uplifting group who swim, travel and live life together and warmly welcome visitors. From the yowling on Sundays, to sharing stories and supporting one another this group is all about inc...

Plans are underway to return Hobart to being a Swimmable City. For thousands of years the Derwent's been used by people for swimming, bathing and fishing. In the 1800s there were a string of public pools in the the river with convicts and the gentry encouraged to bathe regularly. What is the plan? Why do it? Blueroom host Sabra Lane interviews the two people leading the campaign to return Hoba...