I thought I was going to die. But all I came out with was many scratches/bruises and a very swollen leg. But im still smiling. Because what happened could have been much worse, and I feel my bruises do nothing on the feeling of being stuck under water.

Id been wanting to go to Mermaid pools ever since I started my little list of cool places to visit on day trips just under a year ago. Id seen the pictures online and it looked beautiful, and the name itself just called to my inner mermaid. With a solid 6 months of telling my Boyfriend we needed to go, and multiple people from our work taking day trips there before us it was only a matter of time before we ventured up to Matapouri and checked out these pools for ourselves.

It was a beautiful hot day and the drive up left us longing for a little adventure. The beach itself was stunning and calm and a short walk in the warm water lead us to the steep treck up to the pools. With a few people coming down as we ventured up, we got warned not to actually go in the pools as the waves were crashing into them. Witch was a little gutting but we still wanted to see what the hype was about with this place. So we carried on up the steep path.
Once we got up there you could see why it attracted so many people, but we were also very sad that we couldn’t experience it to the full ourselves as there was waves splashing into the pools and we knew better than to test fate with that.
So we took a little stroll along the rocks to get a better look at the many pools that surrounded us, took a few pictures, watched as the waves were starting to calm down and we had just decided that we should go back down to the beach to swim there when it happened.

Out of nowhere this wave came towards us, we immediately backed more into the rock that was behind us, and I quickly turned on my go-pro as wed been like this before, on our badly timed entrance to Cathedral cove, where we both got soaked by a wave hitting us. Naively thinking this would be the same as the previous waves hadn’t been anywhere near as strong. But boom, as soon as it hit I went down. I felt my boyfriend grab me, and for the next 15 seconds we were under water. I remember thinking about all the articles ive read about people getting dragged out to sea thanks to the Swells being so strong, I remember thinking all we had to do was get out here, I remember not knowing if I was breathing or not, and feeling the rocks crash against my back. There was white above me, and the weight of the water dragged me down, I felt like I sunk further than the rocks we were previously standing on, confused with my bearings. We went tumbling down, not knowing how far to the edge we had become, were we going to crash over into the sea?

And then it stopped. We stopped. The wave left. We immediately got up and my thoughts to get out of there kicked in. My boyfriend checked that there wasn’t another wave following it, and shouting to GO. Having the towel in my hand weighing me down and the shock of what had happened I couldn’t see. The water was everywhere and I was still trying to get my footing on the wet rocks. I knew my boyfriend was ahead of me and I knew I couldn’t stop right now. I had to quickly follow his feet as I tried to get my sighting back and as soon as we reached the top of the rocks to where it was dry I started to panic. All I saw was blood on his back and his elbow. I knew that what I felt under there was bad. But I didn’t know how bad. My body was shaking and my breathing was off, we were alive. Blood was pouring out of my legs but it was the last thing on my mind, my body was numb. I wasn’t quite sure what had happened. I felt safe stood there, it didn’t feel as though we were in danger.

We started to make the trek down the hill, which I knew was going to be hard in general, but when you’ve cut both knees and there’s skin hanging off your toe it definitely doesn’t make it any easier. We met a few people who were traveling up to the pools on our way down, who offered us first aid kits etc and seemed worried, it was only at that point I knew it looked worse than I thought. My mind was still numb though and I knew the pain wouldn’t kick in till later. But it was good being able to warn others to stay off the rocks, and a few people took our warning to not go up.

It was by far the scariest experience of my life, knowing that if we’d have gone any further we could have dropped into the sea. Or even if another wave had of come. We didn’t look back to see how far we got dragged down, or where we ended up, but in the footage I have, the view of the sea is very close behind.
I started searching online at some pictures of Mermaid pools when we got home, questioning how all these people got such a beautiful experience and how we ended up limping away from the pools. Till I stumbled across quite a few articles from this month on people being in the pools and it being nice and calm till a random wave came and caused them to go crashing under into the rocks, or one man who was to believe to have broken his leg. All of them had no doubts about their safety, just like us. They’d seen there was no waves, or like we had seen them and not gone near them, but its hard to say what is safe up there.

And now I’m sat here struggling to walk, with cuts and bruises, and a bad memory of a place I fell in love with online. I lost an important ring in the water as well, but I’d have rather lost the ring than my life and I’m definitely going to think twice when I’m around waves now. I don’t know what I would of done if my boyfriend hadn’t of grabbed me in that moment, I know he feels like dragged me down. But I feel as though he saved my life. The weight of us combined would of slowed us down, and knowing he was next to me the whole time kept my body a little at ease despite the circumstances.

The hidden beauty of mermaid pools. Picture found on google.