My mini drama at Barmedman Mineral Pool

We stayed just one night at Barmedman Pool. It has a lovely picnic area adjacent to the pool. We parked just across the road from the park which doubles as the entry to the pool. The picnic area has a lovely green grassed picnic area with 4 covered free gas BBQ’s. The toilets which includes a cold shower block is clean and well maintained. The camp ground is not quite free, with $10 asked for donation.

Barmedman Camp ground

There’s not much in town, a craft shop with a cafe which is closed on Mondays (which is when we were in town) 2 junk shops that are so messy and dusty that I feel uncomfortable in and 2 pubs. I love the look of some of our older colonial style pubs. Diesel here is very cheap at 94.9 cents a litre. It's the best we’ve seen for a while.

Lovely pub at Barmedman

The pool is quite large and is partially covered with shade sails. If the water levels were at optimum then there is a shallow babies pool at one end. However both pools are extremely slippery. I am not sure if it is because of the mineral content or lack of proper cleaning, but there is not one entry that is non slippery.

Barmedean Pool at dawn

There was one ‘local’ swimming laps but otherwise it was empty and Rob thought the water looked cold. I thought I would just step in the shallow depth of maybe 2cm to test the water temperature. I was dressed in shorts and had crocs on my feet. I immediately began slowly sliding and there was nothing I could do to stop my slide. I didn’t mind getting my clothes wet, but I was very worried about losing my balance and falling in thus getting my hearing aid and cochlear wet! Thousands of dollars would have been ruined! Rob said I looked very comical sliding along and not being able to stop.(Pity we didn’t have a video camera) Finally I stopped sliding and the water was above my knees but I knew that I couldn’t even lift my foot without the chance of sliding or even worst of falling in and getting my hearing aid wet. I wanted Rob to walk to where I could see him but it was only pipe work there.I wanted to pass the hearing aid to him as I really believed that it was only just a matter of time before I fell in completely. Even the swimmer had difficulty reaching me too but he came to my rescue and took my hearing aids to Rob before assisting me out of the pool then proceeded to hold onto the pipe and stretch out to reach towards me. Once the hearing aid was safe and dry in Rob’s hand I was able to risk trying to get to the side of the pool with the assistance of the gent who was helping. I managed to get within his grasp without submerging. Once safe on dry concrete we can laugh. I also realized that I had my phone in my back pocket too that would have been ruined.

Advert for a local festival in October

I later walked around the perimeter and saw that the pool might be fine for swimming but there is not one spot where you can safely enter and exit by standing on any non slimy area. Even the stair case with the hand rails had a slimy base. So this is definitely not a safe place to swim if you need to walk in the water anywhere. By the way the pool temperature is not warm but it certainly isn’t cold either. I never did go back in the water. It just wasn't safe!