Olympia — Local services in Scotland

The Olympia - what happened?!?

Firstly, I'll cover what was good. At £17.60 for 3 children and 2 adults for between 60-90 minutes (depends on when you join during a session) it does represent good value for money.

And that's it. That is all I have that is good to say about this place.

Now the bad. And there is a lot of it to cover.

Firstly, the volume of changing cubicles did not appear to match the volume of people using them. I appreciate however it was the last Saturday of the school holidays where weather has turned rather poor, but the volume of lockers in use did not seem to be proportional to the number of shut doors.

The "fun" pool is small to say the least. It might be better when it's quieter but with around 40-50 people in this section alone, it felt very cramped. It also has no real "play" space that would involve swimming. The training pool is not for splashing about it and the splash pool is too small to have a proper muck about in.

It's maximum depth is 1.6m when meant during the waves, I could literally stay standing in the deep end without any issues.

Switching to the river rapids, it's at a depth of 1.0m, about I think that number was used for its width and length too! It's narrow, short and dull.

The dive pool shares the exit of the "cannonball" flume ride which had the diving boards cordoned off from use.

Speaking of the flumes: the green one is still taped off with yellow & black hazard tape mentioned a few weeks ago by another visitor review. Standing in a lengthy queue for the 2 remaining ones (very few kids go on the yellow cannonball) the one thing you will notice is for a place that has not been open long, it is absolutely disgusting. Remember that yellow & black hazard tape I mentioned? It seems to be the all-in-1 repair tape too! It's all over the last step to the flumes platform, which is missing the grip. The platform itself looks like it had the flooring fitting by "have a go Jimmy", something I would have done to save myself a few quid on my bathroom floor. It's in a terrible, disgusting state. Looking at the structure itself, it's painted a bright and airy white, then covered by the dripping orange stain of rust. Seriously, I doubt this place will have the same longevity of the old Olympia pool building. If I had privately paid for this place to be built, I'd be getting to contractor that built it back in to make rectifications to it! I really cant help but imagine 20 years from now, people standing on that platform and it being in the news that it has collapsed.

Truthfully, the Olympia is an embarrassment. It's general maintenance is awful and it's facilities whilst well priced are poor.

Scotland is crying out for a really good indoor water park. Think Sandcastle in Blackpool or waterworld in stoke: Dundee could have had it to match it's V&A museum and other tourist grabbers, but it has sorely missed out on a great opportunity.

I seriously recommend getting up at 4:30 in the morning & driving to Blackpool instead of...

Great pool. Was my first time going there and went with my wife, our 3 year old daughter, some family and our friends. Was 10 of us that went. Little kids pool was great and shallow for little ones and the other part of the pool with the lazy river was good. The siren for the wave machine going on, seemed a bit too much and scared my daughter when it went off. I get why they need it and for the older kids its great but I don't fully understand why it need to be soo loud, specially when the kids pool is right next to it and the end of the flumes is there too. Just a short siren niose with a warning would surely be enough to let people know the wave machine is about to be turned on. The fumes were great and my nephew had a blast on the, although there was no lifeguard or sign at the bottom of the stairs telling people that they can't wear their glasses on the fume nor have them in there pocket, my friend went all the way up the stairs and then was told he can't wear his glasses and had to leave them at the top, so he had to go down the fume then walk up all the stairs to get his glasses to walk all the way back down the stairs again. It is a great pool for family's to go too and kids to play and have fun. The diving pool looked good and the lanes that they had out away for the kids and play pool is good from what my parents said. The changing village was a bit confusing for a first time goer, as told when we first went in that we had to get change in our colour code area but then when we got out and were looking for a family cubicle in our colour code area but there wasn't one, I asked if we were allowed to go to a different colour area to get changed as there was a free family cubicle and was told that you allow to get changed wherever you like, you just have to use the the lockers in the colour youve been given. So that was a bit confusing that two different people as telling people to different things. We would go back but probably not until my daughter is a bit older and can fully enjoy everything this pool...

First family trip to Dundee and won't be the last. A must-visit was the Olympia, having heard others rave about the flumes. Nice welcome on arrival, straight into a clean and spacious family changing room. Got hot showers then straight into the pool. Despite school holidays, it never felt too busy - occasional queue for the flumes of max 5 mins, but usually far less - and we had well over an hour, probably nearer two, before our time was up. Two kids (11 and 8) wanted me to try the Canonball (ends in a 3.8 metre drop into the diving pool) before they gave it a go. Duly done, only to find that, by the time they'd plucked up the courage, the top diving platform was open and so the Cannonball closed. Still plenty to do, though - three other flumes of varying speeds, a wave machine, and a River Rapid that's a lot more fun than it looks. Got back home to East Lothian to discover my son had left his watch in the locker. One phone call to confirm it had been found and they agreed to post it out, at no cost. Will definitely return so the kids can tick the Cannonball off their list. Well...