Day Three: Swimming From Watsons Bay To Cabarita

Extending the swim to include tidal baths and swimming enclosures on the southern shores of Sydney Harbour and the Parramatta River.

Watsons Bay Baths

The first time I'd swum at these baths. A cool morning, but the water was still warm. I swam out under the arches and headed in the direction of Parramatta to keep in the spirit of the previous days.

Parsley Bay Swimming Enclosure

I don't think I've swum at Parsley Bay since the nineteen eighties. Also I used to go snorkelling along the harbour at places between here and Camp Cove. Today, the water was clearer than I expected after the recent rain.

Nielsen Park Swimming Enclosure

I love this little harbour beach. And I love swimming out to the shark net and looking back down the harbour to the city. It still amazes me that the national park and beaches are so close to the central city.

Redleaf Pool (Double Bay)

The first time I had even seen, let alone swam at, this pool. Hidden away in a busy section of the city. The pontoons looked like great fun for the kids. Had nobody else been in the water, I might have indulged myself.

Dawn Fraser Baths (Balmain)

Believe it or not, I had never been to these baths until about four months ago, even though I had been meaning to go for the past twelve years that I've lived in the inner west. The first time I came here I absolutely loved them. I can foresee many summer mornings swimming here in the future. Today I did twenty slow lengths of my lazy breaststroke, loving every minute of it.

Chiswick Baths

I only found out about Chiswick Baths the night before I did this swim. The water was a bit cloudy, but clean and warm.

Cabarita Pool

This municipal swimming pool sort of fits in with my criteria for the swim. The pool is river fed, the water then being treated and heated to 25 degrees. It is a saltwater pool, so I felt I could include it. Plus it was good to go to a warm pool with a hot shower at the end of a longish day of swimming.

So, I had finished a swim from Gunnamatta Bay at Cronulla to Cabarita on the Parramatta River using ocean pools, tidal baths, swimming enclosures and rock pools. Now, though, I felt I should have included other tidal pools west of the Captain Cook Bridge on the Georges River and further along Port Hacking. I decided I would have to fill in these gaps before I could begin thinking of swimming from the north bank of the Parramatta River (say from Henley Baths) along Sydney Harbour and Middle Harbour to Manly, then up the Northern Beaches to Pittwater.