Splash!

In the second of a series of exclusive articles published in association with the new bi-monthly print magazine Dulwich Living, Anna Sayburn extolls the joys of outdoor swimming.

I’m standing on the side, looking down at my blue feet, and the blue water beyond. Everything is goose-pimpled. I’ve been here before, and I know what to do. No messing about tiptoeing in from the shallow end – you need to go straight in at the deep end, gasping with the shock of the cold, then swim as hard as you can until the icy grip eases and you can breathe again.

Ah, the first outdoor swim of summer. There’s nothing that quite shakes off the woolliness of winter, like jumping into a stretch of water sheltered only by the sky. Since we moved to Dulwich, that first swim of the year usually takes place at the Brockwell Lido. This year was no exception.

‘The Lido’s opening this week,’ I said grimly one morning in May, watching grey clouds sent scudding through the sky by the cold easterly wind. ‘It’ll be freezing.’

Any sane person would shrug and decide to wait till a blazing day in July. Not me. Blame it on my Geordie father, and all those summer holidays on the Northumbrian coast visiting Grandma. If you think the Lido’s cold, try Long Sands beach at Whitley Bay, with nothing between you and Norway but sea.

I hate the getting in, but I’ll feel fantastic afterwards. After the heartstopping shock and a few minutes splashing about like mad, a sort of numbness sets in. That’s why you’ll hear loonies like me calling ‘no, it’s quite warm really,’ through chattering teeth.

But, oh, the tingling briskness you feel after a good cold swim! There’s no wake-up call like it. During the summer I try to swim at the Lido before work, a few mornings a week. A quick dip, a cup of scalding tea and toast, then off to work feeling smug as hell. It’s a nice scene, getting to recognise the regular early bird swimmers, from pre-work city slickers to hardy pensioners.

Of course, I’ve enjoyed lazing in warm Mediterranean seas on holiday. But it doesn’t quite have the same thrill as open air swimming in chilly Britain. Over the last couple of years, I’ve splashed about in the sea off Islay in the Western Isles, keeping an eye on the seals basking on the other side of the bay. I’ve stood on the edge of Wastwater in the Lake District at sundown, then swum into the still reflections of the bleak scree fells. Chilliest of all was the dip in Ritson’s Falls, a pool below a waterfall fed by a beck coming off Scafell Pike, the highest mountain in England.

However, by the time you read this, the Lido will have been open for a couple of months, and (fingers crossed) will have had plenty of sunshine to warm it up. So pull on your bathers and come on down. Honestly, the water’s lovely.