A few Saturdays ago the Urban Swimmer packed his knapsack and headed out Highgate way in search of a new swimming venue. Some months ago TUS had been in the Archway area and stumbled across signs for a pool. At the time he had no idea that there was a pool in the area, so imagine his excitement when on conducting an internet search he found out not only was there a pool, but a pool with "a wave machine and flume"! TUS hadn't encountered a wave machine since being about 10, he wasn't entirely sure he knew what a "flume" was, but after he worked out that it was probably one of those big winding slides, he was pretty damn keen to check it out. The exotically named Archway Leisure Centre can be found just around the corner from the Whittington Hospital. The Urban Swimmer's mother has always claimed that he is in fact a very distant descendent of the original Sir Richard Whittington - former Lord Mayor of London, medieval merchant big shot, and famous pantomime character. TUS has always suspected this to be a somewhat tall tale, however just outside the hospital you can see small statue of Sir Richard's cat. The cat is behind metal bars to protect it, and looks a little forlorn like an unhappy monkey at the Zoo. TUS could sadly not hear the Bow Bells ringing from Highgate Hill, as the traffic was rather noisy. Still, the cat seemed a good omen so on he headed.
The first thing to be said about Archway Pool is that sadly, you aren't going to do a lot of swimming in there. Whilst the pool is quite a big 25 meter square of water, it is incredibly shallow. It slopes downwards, but even in the deepest bits you can basically stand up. Although the centre does offer lane swimming during commuter hours, I find it hard to imagine you'd get many laps in without banging your knees. No, what we have here is basically a "family pool", i.e. it's for kids. There are all manner of stuff for kids: funny water jets, a rather tame wave machine, a funny sort of island bit you can swim around, a thing that spouts water over your head, and of course the all important Flume - which was closed: damn it! On top of this TUS went on a Saturday afternoon, when the pool was rammed full of kids and some poor unfortunate parents trying to control the blighters. At the time of my visit there were no less than four life guards on duty to stop the sprogs from drowning.
So there I was, pool you can't swim in, crap wave machine, too many screaming kids, and a broken bloody water slide; not exactly ingredients for a good time. And yet, and yet...weirdly enough, TUS quite enjoyed himself. Why you ask? Well here's the thing, a lot of the time the Urban Swimmer hits the pool, he finds himself in semi-empty pool. Or when he's in a busy pool it's full of serious looking lane swimmers doing endless lengths. But pretty much everyone in this place was clearly having a great time. I mean a really GREAT TIME. Seeing a pool so well used by what amounts to the next generation of London swimmers made TUS feel all warm inside, and whilst he didn't get a great workout he was swept up in the sense of fun and had a nice splash around. I mean to hell with the x-million pound Olympics Aquatics Centre - this is the future.
TUS wont become a regular at this pool any time soon, but he hopes it continues to be as popular as he found it. After his swim TUS took a stroll up the hill to the excellent Prince of Wales on Highgate High Street for some rather more grown up R and R.
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