The Experience: When you are relaxing by Deep Eddy Pool, you can imagine it as it was in the past without much difficulty. The land actually began its life as a resort in 1902, and bathers swam in a natural eddy formed by a boulder in the Colorado River. When A.J. Eilers bought the resort in 1915, he added the concrete swimming pool and more amenities. In its heyday, the resort had slides, diving towers, and a zip line into the pool, Lorena's diving horse, a Ferris wheel, a diving baby, rental cabins, and picnic areas. A picture from that era shown on a board near the entrance of the pool shows swimmers in the water, but even more people lined up in their church clothes all around the pool on a Sunday, clearly not intending to swim, just there for the sights. The pool was purchased by the City of Austin in 1935, and then nearly destroyed by a flood two weeks later. The city cleaned out the pool and the WPA rebuilt the bathhouse, which is still standing today. Deep Eddy reopened as a public park and pool in 1936 and has been a great source of pleasure to Austinites every since. On Saturday nights during the summer, the pool has a movie night with family movies shown on a large screen that you can watch while you swim. The stairs up and down to the pool area are steep, so be careful if you're carrying little ones, towels, and a floaty or two. Deep Eddy Pool is fed clear water by a hand-dug well. The water is cold and refreshing, varying between 68-72 degrees. The pool is large, with a separate area for lap swimmers. The pool for recreational swimmers varies from 3'3” to 3'8” deep, so most kids can touch the bottom and adults stand waist high in the water. The wading area is part of the big pool that is roped off and is very large and shallow. Toddlers can even sit comfortably in the water. The pool is surrounded by a grassy area, so you can bring a picnic lunch or rest on a blanket after swimming. Some of the grass higher up on the hill has stickers in it, so wear shoes while walking in the grass. The recreational part of the pool is frequented almost entirely by families, so the atmosphere is low-key and non-competitive body-wise. It is very relaxing to just bob peacefully in the water, hopefully chatting with a friend or spouse while the kids play a short distance away. The people-watching is fascinating, as some of the pool-goers have large and artistic tattoos (I liked the pregnant women with tattoos on their bellies). Jim-Jim's Water Ice, a vendor of delicious smooth snow cones, parks right outside the entrance and sells velvety black raspberry, strawberry lemonade, pina colada, and mango snowcones.