Tuesday 5 October 2010

Swimming or is that drowning??

Can't believe that all this time has past since my last post. Working on a new project and having so much to read and learn has meant that most evenings my brain is about to implode.
I am just about managing to chillax on FB and play some mindless games ...

Another chillax remedy I have tried to keep up since my hols is to visit somewhere every weekend (not just the supermarket and family).

A few weeks ago it was National Heritage weekend which allowed folk to have open access to places not normally open or usually you have to pay. My mates & I decided to go to Manchester's Victorian  Baths. Built in 1906 as a flag ship swimming baths with Turkish baths and a laundry, it truly is a great reminder of Victorian opulence. A time where people didn't have bathrooms and went to  public baths to wash ... eeeewww!!

Growing up in Southport we had our own Victoria Baths (or the Viccy Baths to us locals). I never realised they were salt water baths ... I recall in the early 70s that it was bloody freezing, old fashioned with cubicle changing rooms on the side of the baths and the swimming teacher would have not looked out of place barking out orders on a parade yard.

Many, many times I thought I was going to drown being dragged along by a rope around my waist and on one occasion I dived in the shallow end and smashed my head on the bottom of the baths ... and yes I really did think I was going to drown then. I was never keen on swimming after that and skived off as many times as I could....

The Victoria Baths in Manchester are awesome. They got a grant for about £3 million and the restoration is quite something although there is still loads to do....







Is this an oximoron btw ??

8 comments:

Diane said...

I used to go to these swimming baths for swimming lessons with my school when I was about 7-8. Didn't appreciate how amazing they were at the time though :-)

Daddy Papersurfer said...

No that isn't an oxymoron!

Were these the baths that were on that Griff Rhys Jones programme? they look very familiar ....

70steen said...

Oh wow Diane ... of course you are a Manchester gal. I know as a kid you don't appreciate stuff like this ... they are wonderful though and I hope they keep raising the funds so they can be open for swimming again one day :)

70steen said...

DP I had to google GRJ and yes you are right they took part in the BBC programme about restoration and Heritage Lottery Funding and won it

http://legacy.hlf.org.uk/English/MediaCentre/Archive/BBC+Restoration+and+the+HLF.htm

nursemyra said...

I'm glad they put a sign up so I'd know the pool was empty.

70steen said...

NM quite a handy hint before you take the plunge ....

nursemyra said...

... and it really is a beautiful building. I love the stairs

fracas said...

"They got a grant for about £3 million and the restoration is quite something although there is still loads to do..."

How perfect!! Winter is fast approaching and DP will require *something* to do. I vote he head over to your neck of the woods and help out!

Love those doors and (like nm) quite like the stairs.