Ride the tide vibe

Tidal pools are so much a part of Cape Town that on any given morning, rain or shine, winter or summer, swimmers or cold water immersion fundis submerge themselves in the revitalising icy waters while the rest of the city's population drives by, heading to work or school along seaside roads through spots such as Camp's Bay, Clifton and Kalk Bay.

“Across the South African coastline there are about a hundred tidal pools,” says Serai Dowling, author of the recently published book, A Guide to Tidal Pools of the Western Cape, an exploration of 34 of the region’s beautiful pools.

“Many of them were documented in Cape Town in 1981 when Stellenbosch University did some research. In comparison with the rest of the world, this region has a disproportionately high number of pools.” The book took Dowling about two years to write and photograph with her collaborators.

“The only other places in the world where tidal pools exist are Portugal and there are a few in Australia and some in the UK, because title pools originated there at the time of the advent of resorts and resort culture. South Africa imported that concept. Some of the colonists and their descendants brought the idea to our shores,” she says.

The history of tidal pools, notes Dowling, is fascinating and complex. “It's tainted by the colonists who brought the pools to this country, but who were also brutal gatekeepers of the geography of the landscape. Our pools today are largely poorly maintained, and yet they provide a backdrop for fun human connection and a sense of respite from the stressors of daily life. We are spoilt for choice, with an array of pools that are rich with sea life, historical depth and cultural relevance.”

Dowling has worked in a number of fields, one of which was in adolescent mental health. “We came to understand the importance of blue spaces for children experiencing high levels of toxic stress. The story that led me to discovering cold water swimming in these tidal pools has developed over the number of years since I moved to Cape Town. I started dipping in the pools, and then I started thinking about how many there were and whether I could I find out more about them and the sea life within them. I researched as many as I could find, receiving help from Stellenbosch University. Because I was so interested in them, I started spending more time in the pools, going quite 'deep' trying to understand everything from the architecture to the social relevance of the pools, from the advent of when and how they were built to the marine life in the pools, their safety and the gear you might need to enjoy them. It all came together in this book.”

The history behind our many pools is fascinating. “Our rough seas are part of the reason they were built,” says Dowling. “Before the tidal pools, the areas may have been fish traps, used for fishing and whaling. Our seas are particularly rough and cold. From 1910, the development of the railways helped to expedite the development of the coastal resorts of the Cape and popularise places like St James, Kalk Bay and Muizenberg (referred to as the ‘Brighton of the Cape’ in tourism guides around that time). The randlords, seeking relief from the heat of the interior of the country, and having amassed vast fortunes thanks to the discovery of gold and diamonds, invested in properties along the coast. They required safe places to swim and so many of the tidal pools were built without permission by people with private homes in the neighbourhoods of the peninsula like St James and Camps Bay.”

Dowling writes in the book, “The construction of tidal pools along the Cape Peninsula coastline began in the late 1890s, with the first one established by a private company in a rocky inlet at Sea Point. More tidal pools were subsequently built along the rugged stretches of this coastline, reaching as far as Camps Bay. As the 20th century progressed and Cape Town expanded, tidal pools also emerged along the False Bay coast, extending from St James to Kalk Bay. In the 1930s, further expansion occurred southward, with the addition of tidal pools at Glencairn, followed by pools at Buffels Bay within the Cape of Good Hope Nature Reserve (now Cape Point Nature Reserve) and Miller’s Point in the 1960s.”

“The creation of these tidal pools was motivated by various factors, including the popularity of sea bathing, its purported health benefits and the enduring influence of English culture on the Cape’s customs,” she writes.

Almost all of them were built illegally, says Dowling. “Private individuals took it upon themselves to engineer their pools. They wanted safe places to swim and have good holidays with their families so there was no specific building style they were going for. Building a pool isn't an easy feat — you have to lay cement but there are all sorts of other elements like rocks  and water. It was important to design them so that waves could wash in and clean them twice a day. In some instances that doesn't happen, which makes them less attractive. I've noted those in the book because you wouldn't want to travel some distance and finds yourself in murky water.”

Dowling first started swimming because she became aware of the health benefits of cold water immersion. “There are great mental health and physical health aspects of dipping in cold water, which I cover in the book. We know that it has a physiological impact for the better — there are various things that happen in the body that confirm this, backed by studies and the work of Wim Hof, who's made it popular. Hof added a breathing element to the activity. We can think of ourselves as a post-conflict zone in South Africa. We meet the same criteria as Liberia and Sierra Leone or Rwanda, for example. Because we have such high levels of violence and multidimensional poverty we're actually able to quantify what that looks like in a body, how that builds up,” she says. “Despite our democratic status, the societal scars of the past persist. According to a 2021 report on the mental state of world, South Africa ranks among the worst countries for mental health.”

We know the physiological responses measured through heart rate variability, she says. “Cold water swimming and being in blue spaces has a positive impact on our mental health and reduces the physiological impact on our bodies. And this has been quantified through various studies published in The Lancet. It's fantastic to think about how everybody from the ladies who lunch coming down to dip in the morning and have a coffee together, all the way to little children who are experiencing some of the worst horrors in our country, can enjoy these spaces together and experience a positive impact as a result of the cold water and the beauty of where they find themselves. These spaces are available to all of us.”

When Dowling went searching for these pools herself, she discovered that many have fallen into disrepair but others are still exceptional and exciting places to swim. “There's a quiet petition going on for the city of Cape Town to take care of these safe, free, open spaces because of the marine life protection,” she says. “For the most part, these pools are gorgeous, but we're seeing more and more plastic. We do pool cleanups at tidal hubs where we incentivise people to clean up their pools and take plastic with them. We're also asking the city of Cape Town to maintain these spaces as well as they can, and for us as citizens to think about how we can participate in their maintenance.”

She adds, “As I've travelled up the coast to these pools I've found that little children are taught to swim in them. There's a movement towards getting people into the ocean, getting them swimming and safe, often by groups who were previously denied access to these places. Tidal pools are a perfect place to do that because they're sheltered.” She says the emphasis of the book is the extent to which they can help with nation building. “They can be used for bridge building, for getting people who wouldn't ordinarily engage with each other to come together to have fun and create connections, even if just for an afternoon.”

A Guide to Tidal Pools of the Western Cape is published by Rockhopper Books and retails at R395. It's available at Exclusive Books.

This article originally appeared in Sunday Times Lifestyle.