HeidiSpain

My family, including three kids are moving to Valencia, Spain for a few months in September. We are all avid swimmers and want to be able to swim laps a few hours a few times a week. What is the lap swimming situation here? I saw a post but it was 12 year old. Thanks for any help!

Lynn R

I am not in the Valencia area, so things may be different there, but in my area of Andalucia since public pools were allowed to re-open after the initial Covid lockdown, there have been strict controls at swimming pools. A lane and time slot have to be booked in advance, and there is a maximum time in the pool per booking of 50 minutes - so unfortunately swimming laps for a few hours is no longer possible. There may be private health clubs which have pools which are not subject to the same restrictions.

Rosemary

Most regions are similar due to following govermental guidelines. Impossible to predict what the situation will be like in September and beyond.

Rosemary

HeidiSpain

That makes sense. Will they allow families to share a lane? Thanks for answering!! It was like that here for awhile as well.

Lynn R

At the pool I use they certainly will - I often have to share a lane with complete strangers! In the 8-lane pool, I think the regulations at the moment allow for a maximum of 4 swimmers per lane, it might even be 6 (in practice there are rarely that many). My local authority operates an online booking system so the regular users book up our preferred slots at the start of each month when the calendar for each month is released. Lanes are booked according to ability (ie the fastest swimmers take the centre lanes and the slowest the outer ones). Don't know if it's the same everywhere, but here to use the pool or any municipal sports facility we must first register as a member and pay €3 for a membership card with photograph, which lasts for 5 years. Then an individual swimming session costs €3, but there are multi-session passes which make it cheaper, I buy one which gives 20 swimming sessions for €30. There used to be one which allowed unlimited sessions during the least busy hours for €25 for a full year but that one hasn't been available during the pandemic.

One thing to enquire about - at the pool I used, "nado libre"/lane swimming sessions are only available to the over 16s which could be a problem if your children are below that age. Not all local authorities may have the same rule though.