Werri Beach Rock Pool – Gerringong

Werri Beach Rock Pool At high tide you’ll have to get your feet wet to access this pool over an exposed flat rock surface. My experience in the rock pool My first experience in Werri Beach pool was not my best: it must have been some time after high tide, the water was almost too warm and there were lots of small bits (probably of seaweed, but I was getting great handfuls of the stuff at every stroke I swam). It’s also quite a shallow pool, and not as long as many – couldn’t Read more [...]

Kiama Rockpool – Blowhole Point NSW 2533

Kiama rockpool ‘Where the sea makes a noise’… My experience in the rock pool This is the pool I go to at the end of a long, hot day since it’s a short walk from my home in Kiama. Although not the size of an Olympic pool, it never feels full, even with 60 tourists messing about on a summer holiday weekend. It’s not the kind of pool you’d do laps in, except on cloudy days when you get the chance to swim alone, but it is a fabulous spot to cool off and just feel the joy of Read more [...]

Kiama Ocean Pool – Pheasant Point Baths 2533

Kiama Ocean Pool The former "ladies'" baths in Kiama My experience in the rock pool This must be one of the biggest ocean pools along the south coast of NSW. It’s about 40m long and wide enough for lots of lane swimming. But you hardly ever see anyone in it, which is really a shame, because the less it’s used, the less frequently it gets cleared out. And this has been the problem for me in each of my dips in this pool. Because the tides only clear the ocean end of the pool thoroughly, Read more [...]

Austinmer Ocean Pools – NSW 2515

Austinmer Rock Pool They say the swell can be so strong here that swimmers have been known to be carried over the edge of one rock pool straight into the other pool without a graze on their body! My experience in the rock pool This was about the most fun you can imagine in a rock pool. Of the two ocean pools at Austinmer, I swam only in the narrower one, which apparently is much deeper and better for lap swimming. Although it was over two hours after high tide when I jumped in, the Read more [...]

Thirroul Olympic Pool – NSW 2515

Thirroul Olympic Pool A proper Olympic size pool, tiled with lane markings, but with water pumped direct from the ocean so the temperature rises and falls with the sea temperature. My experience in the rock pool My first proper lap swim since my shoulder injury so I was taking it easy. Beautiful water temperature, though all the locals were exclaiming at how much colder it was than earlier in the week. It always takes me a little while to get back in the swing of things and into a Read more [...]

Bulli Rock Pool – NSW 2516

Bulli Rock Pool There’s been a rock pool on this site for almost 100 years. My experience in the rock pool I went to Bulli Pool while still under dire warnings from my physio about not swimming due to limited movement in my shoulder. So I was limited to floating around on my back and paddling with my feet and legs only. Still that in itself was a joy in this beautiful ocean pool set against the cliff on a headland with beaches stretching out to either side, and I think you can just Read more [...]

Bellambi Rock Pool – NSW 2518

Surfer gliding past rock pool at Bellambi Bellambi Rock Pool One of the most recent rock pools to be built (in the mid 1960s) My experience in the rock pool I arrived half an hour after high tide, with the waves lapping over the edge of the pool, making for a fairly choppy look to the surface. So I decided to let the water recede a little before taking the plunge. By the time I was in the water, an hour after high tide, the waves were just entering the pool at the far north end, Read more [...]