Taro Leisure Centre

I feel sad having to write this review, we had many years of great times with the kids at Taro before the pandemic. After many disappointing visits in the last year, mainly due to sessions being cut short or the vortex and slide either not being open or only open for a short period of time.

During our recent visit, although lifeguards were around, we were let in nearly five minutes late. Our session was also ended five minutes early. Not only that, the Vortex was open for only 15 minutes and opened and shut early. The same happened with the slide, 15 minutes, it closed 45 mins past the hour, with only about 10 - 15 people left on it. There were also plenty of staff available.

The receptionist was shocked when I told them about it and when I mentioned about the booking system and amount of time in the pool (50 min.), they explained that the management like the booking system, as it allows them to get more people in through the door each day!

While I appreciate their honesty, I feel disgusted that the people managing the pool are more concerned with money than giving customers what they want. We used to spend a few hours at a time, pre-pandemic, but 50 - 60 minutes pool time is pathetic value for money. Considering it takes us 40 minutes to get there, it's no longer an option and my kids and I are very upset about not visiting again.

Coupled with all of this, trying to get a changing room while up to 100 people all change at once is a nightmare, especially with limited family changing facilities. This was never an issue before, as visits were more evenly spread.

There is also a complete lack of COVID-safe procedures, as everyone is crammed into the showers and changing rooms, at the same time. Ridiculous!

I had always led to believe that the booking system was in place to restrict numbers due to COVID, but now, understanding that it is to make more money, we cannot support this venue anymore, especially as there are better value fun pools elsewhere. What a shame.

This is my local facility. By design it is intended to be a facility for all, with flumes and a shallow play area for children and a proper lane pool for recreational or training lane swimming. The same body of water flows through all the different parts of the pool. The changing facility is also within the same space envelope. As a lane swimmer, unfortunately, it is far from ideal: The water and air temperatures are so high that any sort of distance swimming becomes an oppressive experience. I have given up goals of swimming a set distance a number of times through heat exhaustion. And, if you have actually swum and expended any energy in the water (rather than drifting around having a chat), the post swim changing experience is an ordeal. I'm normally drenched with sweat by the time I've got my clothes on and got out of the building.

On the positive side it is well resourced in terms of staff - I counted seven members of staff on duty poolside last night (Saturday 6:30 PM). Unfortunately, despite the number of staff employed, the place always feels grubby. There is always litter in the changing booths, the floor around the pool never looks clean, and there are often floating UFOs (unidentified floating objects!) in the water. The staff could also do with a little customer service training - they rarely make eye contact with customers, there is never a cheery hello or goodbye either from the reception team or the poolside team.

As a recreational lane swimmer, I know I am probably in the minority for this particular facility. It's quite a distance to next available facility however, so it really does need to make sure it is fit for purpose for all, if at all possible. The current setup does not promote exercise as well as it might. At £5.35 for an adult swim (and with no access to the spa/sauna, etc. - that's extra) I'm afraid it represents poor value in comparison to one of its nearest competitors, Mountbatten Leisure Centre's 50m pool in Portsmouth which, at £4.25, I highly recommend. Locals who want to actually swim in a swimming pool may also wish to consider supporting the excellent, charity-run Petersfield Open Air Swimming Pool, which is heated - but not to insane levels, instead, during its summer season.

Although the pool is quite nice, there are sharp edges to some of the tiles in the pool; I have cut my feet each time I’ve been. The showers have been broken on two of our visits and some of the staff, including one of the managers I found quite rude.

An excellent pool with lots of features for kids and grown ups too. The water temperature is a bit too low for very small kids, but there is a nice "spa" bath feature with very warm water to heat up any small people!