Monday 21 January 2008

Happy 14th Birthday to Ben - of swimming and the Oz psyche


We were going to go to the water fun park at Jamberoo, with Ben and three of his mates. Unfortunately the weather turned foul - cold, gusty, and constant rain. Not great for an outdoor water play venue. Thishappened once before, on about his 10th birthday. We're doomed.

So instead we went to Homebush Aquatic Centre at Olympic Park. This is where Ian Thorpe, Susie O'Neill and others won all those medals at the Sydney Olympics in 2000. It's a terrific facility: 7wo 50m pools, one 8 lane, one 10 lane, diving pool, and freeform play pools with rapid river run, water slide etc.

There's also has gym and fitness centre, sauna, steam room, spa pools. There's swimming classes, training squads, all day lap swimming, cafes. You can book childminding, hosted kids' birthday parties, massage and a triathlon club.

I don't think people from outside Australia realise how deeply public swimming facilities penetrate the Australian psyche. To use this facility it cost us $28.80 for 3 adults and 4 kids for all day. I've paid more than that for one person for a single session at a European pool. Trying to find somewhere in Rome or new York for a swim is a bit of a challenge! We get a bit purse-lipped if pool entry gets anything beyond about $5-$6 in an indoor heated centre, $3-4 outdoors. Generally swimming pools are one of the community facilities, along with libraries, parks etc which local government maintains (they are NOT however responsible for education - that's a state government level responsibility).

More pictures of Homebush - click here.


10 comments:

  1. Happy Birthday Ben! (are you the first on the right?)

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  2. That is indeed cheap compared to what i pay here! Would that be in the pool where Inge de Bruin won her golden medals?
    And ofcourse; gefeliciteerd Ben !

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  3. Happy birthday Ben!
    Did the boys get to use the inflatable slide? Must have had a terrific time anyway.
    Completely agree with your comments about the love of Australians for swimming pools. Near our place was the Mingara complex where the Aussie team trained for the Olympics. It opens at 5:30 am every day - and at 6:OO am it's full of people doing laps. Can't think of a French pool where this would happen !!!

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  4. Happy birthday Ben!
    Did the boys get to use the inflatable slide? Must have had a terrific time anyway.
    Completely agree with your comments about the love of Australians for swimming pools. Near our place was the Mingara complex where the Aussie team trained for the Olympics. It opens at 5:30 am every day - and at 6:OO am it's full of people doing laps. Can't think of a French pool where this would happen !!!

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  5. What's all this rain then? In Sydney? In mid summer? I thought drought and rocketing temperatures were the order of the day, not this!

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  6. Nathalie - I'm writing this at 5.34 am - just about to head off to the pool, where I'll be going up and down at 6.05am!

    ineke - yes, indeed!

    Yes, they used the inflatable, thought the queue was pretty long.

    nick - actually, rain in January is pretty normal - we're almost sub-tropical and Jan has one of the highest rainfall averages :-) But it is a bit too cool as well.

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  7. Happy Birthday Ben

    In our local area the pool not opening one day became front page news
    see http://hawkesbury.yourguide.com.au/news/local/general/pool-shut-on-37c-day-as-district-swelters/1163541.html

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  8. A very legitimate complaint, jd!

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  9. Happy birthday, Ben - a day late, or rather two with the timechange. Looked like you were having a best fun. When I lived in Oz I remember reading Robert Drewe - he writes about the beach and water culture, doesn't he?

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  10. What a wonderful way to spend a birthday, and the boys are handsome indeed. Your link and blog on swimming pools was fun to surf and read. Thanks for sending us there!

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