It's Brinkley Davies, the whale diving, ocean-saving gal. Yeah, that one…
Stories about Brinkley Davies are becoming a habit. In 2013, I wrote a story for my magazine Stab called Let’s Make Out! I was very sure of myself and wrote a buttery piece that included this description.
“Brinkley, named after the eighties actress Christie Brinkley, is surf, so surf! Her pops hand-towed her into her first waves at Yorkes when she was but four. Five years later she had given her life to the absurdity of surf: state titles, national titles, pro juniors, yeah, she did ‘em all. Her best result was an eighth, under 18s, national titles. When Brink hit 18 all the contest fever dried up. ‘Cause unless you’re going to join the tour’s swinger’s club, that’s it for a gal’s career.
“Brinkley has more to give the world than cowering before competitive judging panels. She’s an animal activist, a volunteer at marine rescue centres where dolphins, seabirds and seals are rehabilitated, and at the RSPCA. Brinkley is a vegan. She eats raw foods. Survives on juices of celery, carrot and spinach, mint, lemon and ginger juice. And right now she’s in the second year of a four-year (with honours) marine biology degree.”
Such encomiums are typical of the hype that’s de rigueur in my self-propelled marketing machine. But I feel it! I really do! They are not inappropriate! Brinkley Davies’ life has been defined by beauty and a moral perfection; a life without even one day frittered away on silliness.
Six months ago, after a chance re-aquaintance in a Bondi carpark where Birnkley evealed she was on her way home to South Australia after freediving with humpback whales in Tonga, I wrote this (click!).
Swimming with Whales, Tonga from Brinkley Davies on Vimeo.
The narrative continued two months ago, Ms Davies revealed the secret to terrifying great white sharks, whom she swims with daily from a tour boat out of her new home in Port Lincoln.
Three weeks ago, it was the Sydney photographer Richard Freeman who suggested Brinkley might make a terrific model.
“I have ideas,” he said.
These ideas involved a water-glycerin solution, a black one-piece wetsuit and a sparkling but deadly knife that could tear through the outer fabric of a great white’s fuselage.
Brinkley was as fascinated by the idea as Richard (and BeachGrit) and detoured to Bondi after a Reef advertising shoot with Shane Dorian and Rob Machado in Bali.
Conversation over her week in Bondi revealed so many fascinating things. She lives in Port Lincoln with her just-as-impressive boo Ty Swan (click here!). Brinkley’s degree in marine biology was secured in November last year (her graduation ceremony is tomorrow in Adelaide) and, lately, she’s been working on the environmental group she set up with her two pals Siena Schaar and Natalie Parra called Keiko Conservation.
The conversation never stops with Brinkley. In May, BeachGrit plans on joining her for a swim with wild orcas.
Her Instagram is here. (Click!)
And she keeps a relentless blog against thing like captive mammals in aquariums, the culling of sharks and so forth here. (Click!)
In the meantime, click here for the full gallery of Richard Freeman’s photos. They sing!
(Hair and makeup by Fern Madden. Click here!)
(Styling by Nicole Adler. Click here!)
She truly is the world’s cutest eco-warrior.