In at the deep end! Why I’m dippy about the return of the lido
Outdoor swimming might not be the same post-covid but, says Eleanor Steafel, it’s still the perfect way to relax
It’s the routines I’ve missed in lockdown. All those rhythms and rituals that used to drive a week forward – the regular Tuesday lunch date or Thursday Pilates class; the overpriced morning coffee that eased you into the day. But though I can’t say I’ve particularly longed for the 59 bus, I have been desperate to be back in my local lido, where I swam week in, week out, through the coldest winter months right up until lockdown in March. You can keep your pubs and hair salons – I’ve been wanting for nothing more than 50m of freezing water.
Waiting in the sunshine for my pre-booked slot at Brockwell Lido in south London, it’s clear that popping for a swim won’t be quite the same in this post-lockdown world. There are strict time limits on your swim, your name and photograph are taken on arrival, you have to sanitise before going through the turnstiles, and the changing rooms are shut (instead, it’s a shimmy out of your cossie on the poolside). But, as I wait with a mixture of old-timers and newbies for my inaugural dip, I still feel like a sevenyear-old on Christmas morning.
There is much chat about the illicit swims people have managed to get in over the past four months, as well as complaints about how long it has taken to get outdoor pools up and running. While other outside pursuits were permitted, lidos and leisure centres seemed to have been forgotten, sparking Swim England’s #Openourpools campaign. One fan here, unable to go without a regular dip, bagged a couple in the Serpentine before it closed its gates in May, another gave Charlton a go on Sunday, but was disappointed to discover it was heated (“bloody wimps”), another had made several pilgrimages to a river in Surrey to get her cold-water fix.
I’ve missed this community of swimmers deeply. It’s a strange pastime, to chuck yourself into water that in February can fall below five degrees. But it forges this band of brilliant people of all ages who I’ve grown to cherish. There is nothing like a changing room full of women of all shapes and sizes to make you throw the insecurities you lug around with you in the bin. While loitering for a chat remains strictly forbidden now, I’ll miss the warmth of these ambling conversations with those I know only by their swimming costume (chic green Scandi lady, pink lobster print lady, the curly-haired woman who always makes interesting conversation in the showers).
Women rule the lido, you see. My friend Martha and I have met for weekly swims for the past year, and in the dark winter months we’d arrive feeling bleary-eyed and wimpy, but then watch a septuagenarian stride barefoot across the frozen tiles and give ourselves a talking to. There’s a feeling that how you enter the water says something about you, and there does tend to be a gender divide.
In January, as the sun rose over the pool, we’d watch thirtysomething men in expensive wetsuits perform a sort of haka-esque routine, grunting and jumping up and down, bracing themselves for the cold water. They’d storm through two lengths in the fast lane before heading for the sauna.
The women of the lido pull on any old swimming costume and glide into the icy water with nothing more than a bobble hat and a look of pure bliss. There is minimal fuss, just a gritty resolution to get in and get going.
Once, in February, when the water was around six degrees, a heavily pregnant woman walked into the changing room and began undressing. “I’m a week overdue,” she told me as she pulled a polka-dot swimming costume over her bump. “If this doesn’t shock the little bugger out I don’t know what will.” I then watched in awe as she pelted towards the deep end, putting the triangularshaped men in the next lane dipping their toes in and wincing to shame.
It is always worth the initial shock. By the time you turn at the end of the first length the pain has been replaced with a familiar kind of elation, and as I sink into the water it almost seems worth the four-month wait. It’s just as heavenly as I remembered it.
Swimming is a rather more solitary experience, post-covid. The lanes have been widened to accommodate distancing and swimming two abreast isn’t allowed, so Martha and I can no longer talk rubbish; it feels more like exercise when you can’t chat. But it is still the most relaxing thing I can possibly think of doing. For now, I am thrilled to be back in the water. Although if we still can’t use the hot showers in the changing rooms come November, some kind of heated slanket may become a necessity.