A Visit to Salt Water Swimming Pool in Delod Berawah

Hello everyone, I'd like to share my visit to the salt water swimming pool in Delod Brawah Village, West Bali, Indonesia.

I have been to this swimming pool before in 2020, but it was closed due to the Covid. And only recently it was reopened.

When I got there, there was not a single person swimming. It was some time after midday. According to the person who was in charge at ticket, there were not as many visitors as before the pandemic. He guessed the pandemic had caused people's economy worsen that they did not come to swimming pool much.

I noticed the ticket price was 10,000 rupiah for adult or 70 cent USD and 7000 for children or USD 50 cent. I bought two for my children, I did not buy ticket because I was not going to swim.

The pool is located just by the beach, and as you have probably guessed, the pool obtain its water from the sea. This made the swimming pool unique, since there is no other swimming pool that source its water from the ocean in this island.

There are several pipes that connect the sea and several ball shaped containers to store the sea water. The water is filtered from any dirt such as leaves, sea weed, plants or any other small rubbish that can go through the pipes. Next, the water is flown to the pool and left for 8 to 10 hours, usually at the evening.

The next morning, the staff who worked there, cleaned the the dirt that settled at the bottom of the pool with a vacuum cleaner. Bleach, such as chlorine, is used to make the water clean. That's what the person who was in charge at ticket told me.

The swimming pool was built in 2003, the idea was to provide option for people to go to the swimming pool instead of the beach. The ticket man told me the beach nearby the swimming pool is quite dangerous because of sea trench located not far from the shore.

I spent some time observing the swimming pool area. The water was not as clear as the fresh water swimming pool, but the pool bottom is visible. The kids could easily float on the water compared to fresh water.

There were two pools adjacent. The bigger pool, for adult, was about 1.5 meter deep, and the shallower pool is only 1 meter for kids. The underground chamber where the sea water is sucked is located nearby the bigger pool.

There was about 10 meter high slide in the bigger pool for adult. Smaller slides were also available in the smaller pool.

There were several buildings which function as changing room and toilets which look old and dilapidated, but still cleaned regularly. Some tiles on the floor around the pools were missing. Some ladders were broken.

"Our income for this pool per day is roughly 150,000 rupiah (USD 10) per day." said the ticket man.

What? What about the electricity charge, and the maintenance of the pool and staff salary? (Well, I knew there were two staffs).

"This pool is belong to the local government, so all the expense is supported by the government. If this is a private company, it would have gone out of business long time ago. " he explained.

And then it was about 6 PM, the people get out from the swimming pool. It was time to close the pool. I asked my children to wash themselves under the fresh water shower available there and change their clothes. Before heading home, we said thank you to the ticket man who was at the time started his duty sweeping the floor around the pools.

I hope the swimming pool is renovated soon by our government. This would help locals to find inexpensive place for a recreation.

Note: All photos are mine, and taken with Canon Powershot G7X Mark II