Archive for the ‘personal adventure’ Tag

Teenage Swimming Adventure!   2 comments

Stories on the news often stimulate memories, particularly for seniors. Tonight there was a mention of the ‘False Creek’ waterway between West end Vancouver and West side Vancouver. By water it’s about 1.2 kilometers according to A.I.

My friend and I were regular Crystal Pool* swimmers in the 1950’s, not more than 13 years old at the time. After swimming in the Crystal Pool we were still filled with youthful vigor.

For no particular reason one of us, probably me, got the so-called ‘bright idea’ to boldly swim across to Kitsilano Beach (i.e. related Vanier park). It was barely in sight after sunset, directly across from the old Crystal Pool, an area known as Sunset Beach.

 

Since we had donned our street clothes after our swim at the pool, we had to determine how to do this challenging feat. Again we had a bright idea, namely, we would undress (possibly with swim suits on) and place our clothes on some scavenged beach wood in order to keep it dry as we pushed it ahead of us right across the harbor! Of course it also served as extra buoyancy as we hung onto it.

Indeed we did exactly that, keeping our clothes above water as we swam. I have no idea how clean the water was in those days, all I know is it was quite cool compared to the Crystal pool salt water, but not really cold either as this was in summer. Currents, and/or tides, didn’t cause us any problems, perhaps just out of good fortune. In fact as I recall we laughed about our bold endeavor as we kept in contact swimming across False Creek adjacent English Bay.

 

Now when we got across to a rocky beach area, it dawned on us it was going to be an unfamiliar and perhaps distant walk to the bus line needed to return to our homes in Southeast Vancouver!

Since we were flushed with success and feeling somewhat over-confident it seemed only natural we could just swim back to Sunset beach and that’s exactly what we did!

This episode in my young life has remained secret from that day to this as far as I can recall. And please note; I do not recommend it for youths, or anyone today, especially considering the great possibility of a far more polluted False Creek today than in the ’50’s and ’60’s, though I have no specific information.

* Vancouver Crystal Pool history..

 

 

 

 

Posted September 22, 2025 by New2view in Adventure, adventure, Environment, Human relations, life, Uncategorized

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