A testament to the power of a good swim, the stairs leading into one of the two pools that make up Merewether Ocean Baths have been dubbed the “Steps of Knowledge” by locals. Originally built in 1935 and having weathered major storms and an earthquake, the Newcastle site, a couple of hours drive north of Sydney, is the largest of its kind in the Southern Hemisphere. “It’s so liberating, it feels like swimming on a vast, rippling cobalt runway,” says Catherine Brennan, a teacher and London resident who often returns to the area during school holidays and never misses a chance to swim here when she’s in town.

The pools are free and open 24 hours (except for Thursdays during summer when they’re closed for cleaning). The main pool is a 10-lane aquatic behemoth, 50 metres by 100 metres. The smaller wading pool has a sandy bottom that cries out for aqua aerobics or just good old-fashioned splash and play.

Glowing with good health after their swim, regulars gather on this pool’s icing-white perimeter to banter and reward themselves with a sauna, a smoothie or a cocktail. But there’s more to this iconic spot than laps and lotus-eating. The subject of a feature film and fodder for Instagram feeds everywhere, Bondi Icebergs is the world’s most photographed ocean pool. The image of swimmers traversing aquamarine lanes is shorthand for everything that is desirable about Sydney.

Since 1929, it has been a year-round meeting place for the many tribes of Bondi. Andrew Stephen, a South Bondi local, has been coming here for more than a decade. “There are the failed musicians, aspiring influencers, old Eastern European people and a 92-year-old who continues to swim,” he says. The pool is about community and conviviality, and “the coffee’s as important as the swim”.

Sam Ow never learnt to swim and, before moving to Sydney from Malaysia, was fearful of the water. But now, after a cooling dip at Sydney’s Bronte Baths, he feels “renewed and vital”. Back in 1887, when the baths were built, public swimming wasn’t permitted in daylight hours and was gender-segregated. The baths were conceived as a place where people could enjoy the Pacific safely and modestly, and this tradition continues. Handrails and wide steps give gentle access to the water and the protective embrace of the pool’s seawall allows Sam to enjoy Bronte’s unpredictable turquoise waters, without fear of rips, sharks or dunkings.

While this is an ideal place to loll and luxuriate, it should also be a site of pilgrimage for serious swimmers. The “Australian crawl” (now known as the freestyle stroke) was introduced here in 1901 by a Solomon Islander man named Alick Wickham.

The grand old dame of Sydney’s ocean pools, Wylie’s Baths in the eastern suburb of Coogee is a heritage-listed spot with striking views. Cleansing tides fill its depths with colourful fish, sea urchins and the occasional octopus, and the pool’s well-trodden Edwardian boardwalk is a sublime venue for sunbathing, a massage or a snack.

Wylie’s was an early hotspot for Australian competitive swimming and among the greats to take the plunge here were friends and rivals Fanny Durack and Wilhemina (Mina) Wylie, the first women to ever win Olympic gold and silver medals in swimming and arguably the two greatest female swimmers of the early 20th century.

Mina’s father established the pool in 1907 and since then, countless swimmers have followed in her wake, gracefully clocking up lengths. Elspeth Menzies (above) works close by and says, “There’s something meditative and timeless about Wylie’s. It stills me and entices me back time after time.”

Septuagenarian Ray Ziesing (above) is a year-round early-morning ocean swimmer who says “there’s nothing like starting the day in seawater”. As well as being a member of two community swim squads, Ray regards Coalcliff Pool on the South Coast as “among the state’s most glorious swims”. Set in the middle of a rock shelf, it’s a charmer that has attracted swimmers for a century.

Found between Sydney and Wollongong, in what was once a working-class mining community, the area’s dramatic escarpment and churning surf were made famous by D.H. Lawrence’s novel Kangaroo, written when he lived for several months in Thirroul, just south of Coalcliff. Folklore holds that miners smuggled dynamite out of the pits to blast the beginnings of the pool. Fact or myth, the story underlies a truth that the state’s coastal geology is particularly suitable for pool construction. Ray is repeatedly drawn here. “The sheer pleasure of being in its clean, salty water is addictive

Like many NSW ocean pools, Bulli Rock Pool, on the South Coast near the city of Wollongong, was a Depression-era public works project. Apart from creating much-needed employment, the construction of ocean pools in the 1930s was a conscious investment in community and national wellbeing at a challenging time in Australia’s history.

This fine example holds pride of place on the golden shoreline of the small town of Bulli. Facing directly to the ocean with sandy beaches left and right, it sits like a pale blue welcome mat to the Pacific. An expansive park and café overlook the pool, which is particularly popular with families. Teenagers holler and whoop as they hang onto the main pool’s railings as waves sweep over them, while littlies splash in a small adjoining pool.

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