I live in Cornwall. We are so lucky to have such stunning beaches and coastline but I am not a natural water lover, I have to really work at my relationship with the sea. When I was a youth, I was swept out to sea on a rip tide with two of my siblings. One managed to scramble back along rocks to safety but got lots of injuries on the way. He alerted the coast guard and our parents. It was a bit too late for my sister and I as we were unable to fight the current and were swept out more. Eventually I had this idea that we should float, as we were clearly wasting energy trying to get back to the beach. The waves were huge though and we were getting less time to breathe in between. It seemed that we were being swept towards the rocks. This would have been horrifying earlier but suddenly the rocks began to look like the only way to survive. We used what energy was left to swim to the rocks to see if we could get out of the water. At this point no help was on the way yet and even if there was, we wouldn’t have noticed. I remember trying to clamber up the rocks, almost making it and then being ripped off them again by the retreating waves. This happened over and over. I actually thought I was done for. I remember thinking, oh this is when I die. Then out of nowhere, one of my efforts to climb the rocks was successful. It was as if I was lifted out of the sea magically and found myself on solid rock. What a shock that was. I then realised I couldn’t see my sister and had the worst imagined thoughts about what had happened to her, when just as sharply she also was lifted out of the sea and onto the rocks. We couldn’t believe it and moved back as far as we could away from the crashing sea.
Today, I went to a natural rock sea pool, on my own. It was so beautiful. Early in the morning, I had the pool to myself. I couldn’t believe how happy I felt to be there. Just close enough to low tide that some sea spray was visible over the rocks but the pool itself, calm and flat and most importantly for me, safe. This was a big deal.
Yesterday, I visited the sea pool at Trevone with my youngest daughter. This is a pool we have been to with family, friends and even an outdoor group that we ran, many times. It was pretty busy with people but also jelly fish. It felt like the water version of flying ant day except we seemed to arrive on jellyfish day. The warm temperatures and the fact the pool fills with the tide had left some jelly fish stranded until the next high tide. We did our best to swim around them which was tricky, as the usual way you enter the pool was where they had all congregated. An area at the back seemed mostly clear of jelly fish risk and we still had a lovely time. My daughter is readying for university this year. The youngest of three, she will be the final child to launch. Every time a child leaves home, everything changes but this time when the tide goes out, my life will not look the way it has for the last 26 years. This is such a major transition. We are both aware that these times are moving fast and that we don’t know what the next tide will bring in.
I suggested that we spend the summer exploring the sea pools of Cornwall before she moves away. I love a project, I love to gamify, it helps me to stay motivated and also remember what I love-it’s a short cut to decision making, all good neuro-divergent hacks. She is up for it. This is good. She has always been a water baby and I was not the water confident parent of this Mer-baby. Sea pools may be some of the few watery places where we can connect. Tomorrow we are going to Bude, the famous lido pool that a dedicated group of people managed to save and maintain. We have swum there many times and even in winter in the hail. I have managed Bude sea pool a few times with others as it feels contained and safe enough. There is another lesser known pool nearby, that I also hope we will find.
There is something about a sea pool that means that I can access them, even with my near drowning trauma. This of course is in many cases why they were created. Sea pools represent a small part of the wild sea that is momentarily contained. A natural pool, a reinforced or fully engineered structure like Bude or Jubilee pool in Penzance or one blasted out of rock pools by the miners of Cornwall, all serve to make the beauty of the sea more accessible and safer.
I have visited 4 sea pools in 4 days, in a kind of hyper-focused frenzy. I’ve been keen to research and write about each one. Yesterday I was so tired. It was also heat wave and I struggled to stay awake. A quick google search tells me all of the reasons why sea pool swimming may be exhausting, what impact it has on your body and brain. I’m tempted to find another tonight, that will be 5 in 5 days and then maybe I won’t make it to work on Monday. There are many other sea pools, with their own histories and people who visit on holiday or each morning before work. Some of the places I have knowledge of and connection to, others are new to me, even though they are still in the county where I live. As I write, I realise there is more to say than one article or essay could possibly cover. This now serves as the introduction to a series of writings exploring the history, folklore and experience of Sea pools in Cornwall, alongside my personal journey, people and creatures I meet, the photos taken and drawings that I make.
These pools are tidal. They fill from the sea at high tide every, 12 hours or so. In between the high tides we can search for the often hidden places where these sea pools exist and swim or dip in fresh sea water until the high tide approaches again. Many of these pools were created by someone in the local community across the centuries, for safety or for leisure or for one of the big health fashions that arose over the decades. Some are natural, a large rock pool maybe, some are named Mermaid Pools.
I know many people have written about the phenomenon of cold water swimming. I’ve never felt able to join this trend, despite the potential benefits to body and mind that I definitely needed. I have sat on the rocks as my children splashed around in the sea in all seasons, remembering how much I loved it as a child but unable to make the leap to join them. I’m not sure there is much written about sea pools specifically as many hardcore dippers and cold water swimmers might not bother with them. Some of the history and folklore around these pools and places may also not be common knowledge or almost impossible to dig up at all. As I floated about in a pool in Porthtowan yesterday, some women on holiday asked me if I was local. I explained that I lived in Cornwall but was visiting sea pools. I introduced the project to them and they loved the idea. I told them “It’s my Primary School Sea Pool project”. The 1970’s style school project with its opportunity for ideas and exploration to be more like a sunburst than a straight line. With drawings and photos and any aspect of the subject matter uncovered in total joy and excitement. They understood and emphatically agreed. This time, it’s not about dinosaurs or volcanoes, it’s about sea pools. I hope you will join me on this adventure, on my midlife, Primary School style project. I’m not sure exactly what it will look like but I will begin with naming each chapter after a sea pool and we will see what happens after that.