A weeks later we had a team trip to Tenerife which was really good but very hard. There was 40 swimmers so it was a big team and Ben Titley's squad came with the university squads which was great as I got to spend time with the girls and got pushed harder in training.

For such a big group we got on really well and trained really hard there was lots of different sessions like maximum kicking relays. I always thought relays were fun but after my last leg of the kicking one I soon realised they weren't.

We were lucky to get some great weather as-well which made training a lot more enjoyable.

We went to a training camp called T3 situated on top of a hill which made the walk to training in the morning slightly more challenging! On afternoons before swimming the coaches tried to come up with new ideas of land-work to do and on some of the days we all took part in an obstacle course. Which involved monkey bars,jumping over hurdles and climbing up rope walls! All in all it was great fun to do something different and everyone felt the sore the next day.

After a hard day's training at the end of the week we all decided to sit down and watch the Bird's show put on in the hotel which if I'd known what was going to happen at the end I probably wouldn't have sat down for! The guy running the show was an entertaining Italian guy getting people up to hold some of the bird's. I am not a fan of bird's so I was doing everything I could to avoid eye contact with him so I didn't get picked but before I knew it at the end he was standing infront of me pointing his finger at me to get up...After some encouragement from the others I found myself stood up holding my arm out with a leather glove on being told the bird that was going to land on my arm was huge, couldn’t be looked in the eye and might try to peck my ear. I was petrified and if birds were anything like dogs and could smell fear I was in a world of trouble.

Shortly after I felt a huge weight on my arm as I looked from behind my fingers I saw these huge claws and was shaking with a leaf. All the ooh's and aah's coming from my friends in the crowd didn't help either, I then looked over and saw I was holding a giant eagle. I can safely say I was terrified and the guy doing it could see it so he came over and showed me the eagle was quite friendly after his build up! I'm glad I did it as it was a great experience but I will never be doing it again. It was a great way to round off a great training camp and before we all knew it we were back in the airport boarding our flight back to Loughborough.