So, a while ago - back when 'Lockdown' just sounded like a direct-to-DVD Steven Seagal movie - Idecided to go and photograph some derelict open-air swimming pools around the Isle of Man.
No, honestly, I'm fine. How are you?
They're rather haunting places, and I think that was what prompted me to use black and whitephotography. So while the pictures don't stand much chance of being snapped up by the Department ofTourism for a chirpy advert, I thought it might be fun to take a metaphorical deep dive into these formerbaths.
Our first port of call has a charmer of a name. In Peel, we have Traie Fogog, which translates intoEnglish as Periwinkle Bay. It's almost too cute, isn't it? Just toppling slightly over from kitsch to sickly. Itconjures up visions of a place where posh children foil smugglers' plots in an Enid Blyton book. Maybewe should stick with the Manx name, even if that sounds like a cigar smoker clearing their throat.
In the picture, you can see a wave forming a line across the mouth of the bay. This is the water hittingthe outer wall of the pool, which remains. Since the pool was closed in the 1950s on safety grounds (thecliffs were eroding) I imagine that the wall has worn lower and the sea level has become higher.
Heading to Douglas, and here we have Port Skillion, which nestles just below Douglas lighthouse. WhileTraie Fogog is still recognisably pool-shaped, nature has very much reclaimed this one. Apart from a fewstumps of wall, and concrete patches where people once dived, the cove looks pretty much wild. In thelate 19th and early 20th century, Port Skillion was a little resort in its own right. It had stalls andamusements and even a funicular railway up to Douglas Head. Nowadays, there are evocative littleremnants, like the bits of the pool, dotted around the area. A bramble-infested scar up the hillside iswhere the railway once climbed. There are flights of stone steps that lead nowhere. It's all deliciouslyodd.
When the pool was opened, it was strictly for gentleman bathers, but the fact that a public path ran withinperving distance, did not escape the attention of the local ladies. This produced an outraged letter to theeditor of the super-soaraway Manx Sun newspaper, dated 23 August 1884:
"SIR...I refer to the gross indecency of the dresses worn by men bathers. They are dwindled to almostnothing. In old days, when men bathed with no covering, things were better; for women kept away, orwere ashamed to be seen near the bathing places. Now, however, Port Skillicorn, is thronged withwomen gazing at the bathers. This being so, the dress worn ought to be decent. It should reach at, leastfrom the waist to the middle of the thigh,... It is also a mystery that women can be so lost to all sense ofmodesty as to haunt what is in fact an exhibition of naked men. .. Faithfully yours A Manxman."
Now let's do what 'A Manxman' was wishing the hems of the Port Skillion bathers' trunks would do, andhead south. Traie Meanagh (quite boringly, Middle Bay in English) is in Port Erin. This is the most intactof the pools I've visited. I mean, it also looks like a war zone, but there's quite a lot of the structure stillintact. Daringly, for 1899 when it opened, Traie Meanagh allowed mixed bathing. 'A Manxman' probablyhad a canary before he could reach for his letter-writing pen.
Amazingly, this pool stayed open until 1981, decades longer than the other two. You could havecelebrated Bucks Fizz's Eurovision Song Contest victory by taking a swim in Traie Meanagh if you'dbeen making your mind up to do so.
These three are by no means the only open-air pools that once graced the Isle of Man's coasts. Allconjure up an image of days when tourists were a tough bunch, unafraid of alfresco bathing, despiterandom northwesterlies blowing a hoolie in a time before climate change had properly kicked in. Theirwaterlogged, low-lying locations should protect these places from bland redevelopments. But I do think afew more winter storms could wash away a lot of their form. So if you want to explore these relics of thetourism heyday, don't delay and dive in as soon as you can.*
*Again, when I say 'dive in' I obviously mean it metaphorically. Do not, under any circumstances, literallydive into these long-abandoned baths. At least not without a stomach pump, a tetanus shot, and yournext of kin's contact details tattooed on an accessible part of your anatomy.