Meet the Buckettes: A Morning Ritual at Mona Vale Rock Pool

This story is from my first book, Rock Pools Sydney — a 200-page coffee table book about Sydney’s rock pools and the people who love them.

It started around 15 years ago when three women – Jenny, Pauline and Margo – would take turns standing in an ice-cream bucket full of hot water as they dried themselves after a winter swim. As their morning laughter attracted like-minded women, the group slowly grew to become 25 swimmers known as the Buckettes, who starred in the award-winning short documentary Sea Birds.

Together they have explored Sydney’s rock pools, made yearly trips to Moree’s hot springs, and celebrated big birthdays with lovingly hand-knitted socks. While some women prefer swimming in the Mona Vale rock pool, others would rather dive into the ocean, but they all come together for post-swim coffees and chats where they support each other through thick and thin.

Mina

For most of her life Mina Pontello didn’t know how to swim and didn’t care. Then at age 62 she found herself looking at the Mona Vale rock pool and wishing she could join in the fun. “I just realised that I was missing out. I thought, ‘I’ve got to learn how to do it.’” So Mina taught herself to swim. By watching YouTube videos.

“I’d look up what to do and start off with the breathing. Then I’d do two laps and then four, and eventually worked my way up to a kilometre in the pool. Then I thought, ‘Hmm, I wonder whether I could swim out there?’”

For her first ocean swim Mina asked some of the Buckettes if she could go out with them. “When we got out there I asked how deep it was because I’d never been anywhere I couldn’t touch the bottom. And when they said, ‘It’s quite deep’, I swung around and squealed with delight to think that I was in deep water.”

These days Mina can be found swimming across to the headlands at 6.30 every morning, or back in the pool doing laps if the surf is too rough. “I think it just proves you can do anything at any time in your life. If you’ve got the motivation, if there’s something you really want to do, you can do it.”

As for the Buckettes, Mina says they’re friends for life. “We laugh the most when we’re all down there together. It’s just such a happy place. They’ve certainly added joy to my life.”

"When we got out there I asked how deep it was because I’d never been anywhere I couldn’t touch the bottom."

Vicki

When Vicki Ratcliff first started swimming at Mona Vale 10 years ago she quickly realised there was a fun group of women who bonded in and out of the water. “A friend and I were sort of wandering around the edges for a while. Then one day we were handed a t-shirt with Buckettes written on it, and we knew we’d made the club.”

Vicki says she feels blessed to be a part of a group with such a special connection.

“The bond is formed by the ocean, but it goes beyond that. They care for each other an awful lot and support each other. I remember it was somebody’s 70th birthday and she really wanted to go for a swim but the water was wild. So a group all held hands for a safety chain, went into their knees and dunked down where they were swamped with waves before quickly getting out of there.”

While some days are too wild even for the pool, Vicki says it often feels safer in there, particularly during blue bottle season.

Vicki has shared some of her love for the Buckettes through her paintings, which sell in city and country galleries, and also painted a mural on the old amenities block where the women first stood in ice cream buckets, before the building was demolished. That little piece of history may now be gone but the Buckettes will live on for years to come.