Zurich - Trying Out a New Pool

Swimming Pool at Kloten

It’s quite frustrating with my local pool being closed as it’s not so easy to go swimming. I have to allow more time for the journey and time myself according to public transport rather than just walking out the door when I’m ready (which is much more my style).

I’ve mostly been going to the Oerlikon pool. It has 50m lanes and is often quite busy compared with my old pool. The 50m length is good exercise for me. Even though I do 1km non-stop in the open water, somehow I find 50m in a pool quite challenging. Maybe it’s the pressure of swimming with other people around me, or maybe the whole psychology of being in a pool with lanes giving the impression of serious speedier swimming, or maybe that there’s a fixed / potential stopping point to aim for, or perhaps even all of these things that makes me unwittingly tense up.

Since I don’t want to have to overtake or be overtaken, I’ve changed my training from swimming distance to swimming one length at a time and focusing on technique, with each length having its own focal point. I’m quite enjoying this.

However, I’ve been missing my quiet 25m pool, both because it’s quiet and also because 25m is much easier if I’m trying out a new drill or just generally. So, I decided to go to Kloton and try out the pool there as I’d heard it was good.

I always feel nervous going to a new pool for the first time. I decided to buy a 12-for-10 ticket (although I wish I’d bought a 6-month pass now). This lets you in electronically. It shouldn’t really have stumped me, but the gate to go out had been left open (which, unknown to me, shouldn’t be), so I wasn’t sure if I needed to check myself on the way in or on the way out. I thought about just going in through the exit and maybe getting a free swim, but my conscience got the better of me and so I hopped about on the spot agonizing over what I should be doing. In the end, I was there so long that another person came along and went in, so I just followed her (it turns out that you check yourself in and on the way out, so sirens would probably have wailed if I’d exited without a corresponding check-in recorded).

The changing rooms have a rather (to my mind) strange allocation of a barefoot zone, so I couldn’t go straight to the toilet and I didn’t want to wait until I was undressed, so I broke that rule but was just waiting for someone to reprimand me (nowadays, I just yank my shoes off if I need to go first!).

I changed and then duly took my shower before going to the pool. However, an alarm sounded just as I stepped out of the area. I stood, paralysed, my first thought being that I must have triggered it somehow; I must have looked how I was feeling because someone else who was there reassured me that it was OK. It turned out it was just a man coming in to check for cleanliness. My nerves were in tatters.

I stepped out into the corridor going to the pool but was confused to see steps going up (you usually go down to get to a swimming pool) and so I wondered if I was going in the wrong direction, particularly since there was a strong smell of urine. I returned to the changing rooms, but all the signs indicated that I was going in the right direction, and the steps were the only way to go at the end of the corridor. It was indeed correct.

It was a huge relief to be in a quiet, 25m pool again (not to mention to have actually found it). I had a lane to myself and swimming 25m was so much easier and such a luxury. I felt I could have gone on forever. However, the armband with my locker key fell off during all my exertion and was now in the middle of the pool. I swam over it time and time again as I did my laps, trying my best not to think about it. But I knew that at some point I’d have to speak to someone. Ugh. Eventually, I asked who I thought must be a lifeguard if he could retrieve it. To my surprise, he spoke to two young girls in the children’s pool (they looked about 6 years old!) and they came over to the main pool and deftly dived down and retrieved it quicker than I could blink. It was impressive.

On returning to the dressing room, I found it a bit bizarre that you seem to have to bring your own hairdryer, although plug points are provided. After I’d dressed, I finally located some fixed, wall-hung hair dryers but these were in the dreaded barefoot zone. Once again, I had to break the rules by entering this area in my shoes. I wanted to be quick and unobtrusive, but unfortunately I couldn’t fathom why the hairdryers wouldn’t work. I kept on moving my head underneath one of them, but no hot air came out. I tried another one, but that didn’t work either. It was most puzzling. Finally, the cleaner (who didn’t mention my shoes) informed me that I needed to press a button to turn it on. Doh.

However, despite all these agonizing moments, the pool was great. I’d like to go there all the time, but the trains only go every 30 minutes, so it’s not practical. I now save this pool as my weekend treat to myself. And, of course, I’m an old hand now, so no more traumas.