They are sisters and took the plunge. Together, Colombe and Marine Schneck have tested all the capital’s swimming pools, and have compiled a book, which lists in text and illustrations the specificities of each of them. “Paris à la nage: Guide des piscines parisiens” is to be published this Thursday, May 5.
Access, cleanliness, water temperature and quality, but also prices and length of pools… Everything has been scrutinized and listed in this guide to Parisian swimming pools, sorted by arrondissement from the 1st to the 20th, where you can find also three intruders, the swimming pools of Puteaux (92), Orsay (91) and Châtillon (92).
Forty swimming pools to test
“In Paris, there are about forty swimming pools open to the public (between the closures for works that last and the new swimming pools that open), that makes about one to visit per week in a year. Why not redo the trip from pool to pool of John Cheever in Connecticut and Carolyn Kormann in New York, but in Paris?” asked Colombe, who explains that she started swimming late, after a breakup.
“When Colombe suggested that I do this guide to the swimming pools of Paris with her, I thought it was a great project,” thought Marine, her sister, believing that “exploring and discovering our city through its blue waters would be a unique and fun angle of travel”.
A journey that began in August 2020, after the first confinement, and which has just ended. “Colombe observed” and “Marine illustrated”, we are told. For more than a year, these two sisters simply got together to swim together, chat with the regulars of Parisian swimming pools and have a drink to debrief.
And the result gives a complete guide of more than 300 pages, where we find just as many anecdotes and other details that make the magic of the place or, on the contrary, spoil it a little. One of the swimming pools will thus be highlighted for its sunroof or its superb outdoor space, while the other will display borderline cleanliness or a temperature that is too cool.
Written with humor and punctuated with pretty drawings, this guide above all offers a good overview of what awaits the (future) swimmer, who would be tempted to enter the establishment. A book produced in collaboration with My Little Paris, where you can also find some good places to go after a good swimming session.