The Devil’s Swimming Pool: Swim On The Edge Of The Victoria Falls
Thu, Apr 24, 2008
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When I was in school, I was obsessed with the Guinness Book of World Records.
Not the big glossy one they have now either; the black and white pocket encyclopedia for geeks. As part of my everlasting nerdishness, I was obliged to know the biggest and longest and oldest of as many things as I could. One of these of course, was Victoria Falls: the largest sheet of falling water in the world, which lies on the border of
Maybe the most interesting thing about the falls however, isn’t the sheer size of them, the unusual shape of the falls, or the wildlife around them– it’s a swimming pool. As it happens, you can hang yourself inches from certain death quite comfortably in a rock pool right on the edge of the fall.
Image from Fritz Da Kat
Looks like she’s about to take the 360-foot plunge, doesn’t it? Afraid it’s not true, as long as it’s not the wet season when the water is high enough for the current to actually sweep you off the edge. People can safely cavort in the “Devil’s Swimming Pool” without any problems. It’s so safe in fact, that these people took their kids:
Image from Afric Photos
Of course, I’m not sure you’d want to put your ten-year-old in that position. Thinking of my stepbrothers, I’m almost certain somebody would end up dead. But the pool remains that safe, and people are consistently drawn to it.
Images from St.Jai4us
Image from Fritz Da Kat
If you have any knowledge of any other amazing rockpools, why don’t you drop us a comment. We might follow it up in a further post.
Major H/T to Life in The Fast Lane
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1 Trackbacks For This Post
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The Path of Zath - Volume 11 Says:
August 29th, 2008 at 1:58 pm[...] you fancy going for a swim in the Devil’s Swimming Pool? – It’s a real interesting concept and one that has a strange attraction for me, surely [...]
April 24th, 2008 at 8:52 pm
Breathtaking, yet scarey as all hell. No matter how safe it is, I don’t think I could bring myself to swim there.
I’m also terribly afraid of heights.
April 24th, 2008 at 11:13 pm
i did this once, on the zambia side too. i asked our guide if he’d ever lost anyone and he laughed. that should have been my cue to run away fast but instead i got in the water and hung over the falls like superwoman. i guess going to africa in the first place is insane enough (to some) that once you’re there, things like this seem like no big deal.
April 25th, 2008 at 12:58 am
wow! anyone who wants to swim on the edge of a waterfall is stupid! You could fall off and die.
April 26th, 2008 at 1:33 am
What a cool thing to see – I’ve never heard of this before despite seeing stuff about these waterfalls before.
I’d like to think that I’d be up for having a go at this – the idea of it is very cool if nothing else!
April 27th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
And people thought Micheal Jackson was an irresponsible parent for simply holding his child out over a balcony railing.
April 28th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
That looks great! I would LOVE to be in the pool with all those kids!
May 19th, 2008 at 4:17 pm
Not many brothas go there I bet
July 15th, 2008 at 7:12 pm
whats does that have to do with Mk?
September 9th, 2008 at 8:57 am
That is crazy scary, I mean what if you fell off??!! I wonder if the devils swimming pool has claimed any lives… I WOULD NOT RISK IT…it makes my stomach churn just looking at it
May 13th, 2009 at 2:06 am
Mark Barber Says:
April 28th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
That looks great! I would LOVE to be in the pool with all those kids!
oh my god, ew, and why am i the first person to reply to his post in over a year?
June 16th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
Looks great but maybe too risky for me, maybe if there was a rope I could hang onto or something I’d feel a bit more confident.
June 23rd, 2009 at 10:59 am
I totally agree with Suzanne, it’s stupid, you could fall off and die. Also, anyone who crosses the street is stupid, you could get hit by a truck and die. And anyone who gets dressed in the morning is stupid, you could get your feet tangled up in your pants, fall over, hit your head on the dresser and die.
June 27th, 2009 at 2:36 pm
It would be useless to later claim “I just turned my head for a second!”, when your six year old is added to the list of those who ignored the first warning on the sign!
What YOU do for excitement is one thing… cg
July 3rd, 2009 at 9:17 am
Breathtaking, yet scarey as all hell. No matter how safe it is, I don’t think I could bring myself to swim there.
July 7th, 2009 at 10:30 am
I did this on the Zambian side and it was scary to walk through the waterfall with water up to your knees only 10 meters from the edge of the waterfall. The pool itself is not scary att all, that’s the nice part of it :)
October 7th, 2009 at 4:02 am
Actually, I do know of a similar rock pool – summer use only and probably not sanctioned by the authorities. It is at the top of Yosemite Falls in California,
and the drop from there is about 2400 feet, interrupted a very long way down by the pool above the lower falls… I swam there with a couple of friends when I was 14 – that was 52 years ago and it wasn’t exactly open to the public then, but, there was no one watching either… The pool was roughly rectangular and about 50 or 75 feet long by maybe 30 feet wide, I have no clue how deep – but the water was emerald green and it ended in a stone shelf about three or so feet wide with just a couple of inches of water flowing off into the abyss. Crawling carefully out to the edge you could look straight down into the lower pool, I think it’s about 1800 feet, it was awesome. I just checked Wiki: Upper Falls: The 436 metres (1,430 ft) plunge… Obviously they don’t know about the pool at the top – but it’s there. Total height of the falls is listed as 739 metres (2,420 ft) from the top of the upper falls to the base of the lower falls.
December 31st, 2009 at 5:36 am
that woman screaming looks like she falling off the edge holy wow that looks awesome but im 2 chicken 2 do that because i ten i cant watch scary movies y on earth would i do that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!think question ask