Cally Pool & Gym

Positive experience: Lovely pool and gym. Despite the gym being small. It's very well equipped and I'm able to get a full workout. The staff are very friendly and very supportive.

Negative experience: The changing rooms and showers are super dirty. The shower water scorching hot with no way to adapt the temperature. Gym is tiny. There is one leg press, 3 treadmills, steps, a rower and maybe one upper body? thats it

Positive experience: Very friendly and helpful staff especially Sherina who has been at the front desk a couple of times when we have come to Cally Pool with our 8 year old niece. Staff at Cally are far more friendly and helpful than at other Better pools we have used including Kensington Leisure Centre and Britannia. It was great that Cally provided some toys and noodles for children to use in the teaching pool. This is the way to go if you actually want children to learn to swim. The teaching pool at Cally also seems to be open for Swimming for All far more often than teaching pools at other Better pools. Although Britannia is a much newer pool the staff at Britannia were particularly unhelpful and unfriendly. Perhaps Cally staff could help train staff at other Better centres to be better!

Fantastic experience: I use the cally pool pretty much every morning and I love the staff. They are all super supportive and I always feel so safe at this pool. The staff do a great job in asking everyone to remove their shoes and keep the swim areas clean and tidy. Fantastic pool, amazing staff. Shareana and Marco are incredible. And all are fab. Well done everyone who works at Cally pool. If you are going to use the Cally pool please remove your shoes and help Cally staff keep standards high.

Fantastic experience: Sauna x swim and Gym good combination

Negative experience: Ready for bacterial infection,jump into this pool The edge if the swimming pool (once you enter the first corner ) is green ,they don’t bother to clean and sanitise it .I went for swim doctor women only ,teachers were not great ,one of them was pregnant and was just chatting with two learners.What was the point for me to pay £11 for swim doctor and just listen to her sweet memories!

Negative experience: The changing room is always dirty, you are walking between the rubbish, you can find dirty nappy and plaster with blood on the floor. The manager doesn’t care about it , he told me they are under staff so I should say thanks to him that he is keeping the swimming pool open.if you are under staff better be closed! Disgusting

Negative experience: Agree with the consensus that staff are friendly but changing rooms, pool side and pool itself were very very dirty. What hasn’t been mentioned is during the day more than half the pool is used up for swimming lessons, meaning only two skinny lanes for fitness and no room to over take. The whole ‘medium’ lane was hogged by one man swimming very slowly for my hour long swim so I didn’t feel like I got a good work out at all. Other Better pools in the area have separate pools for fitness and lessons so I would prefer to go somewhere that isn’t overrun with badly behaved kids!

Fantastic experience: Great gym and pool - would be great to have music on in the pool though!

Fantastic experience: Great sauna and baths

Fantastic experience: Another excellent pool

Positive experience: The gym is good, good machines, clean, good temperature and not busy. There are two swimming pools, the one I used is very long 25mt, plenty of lanes, not busy when I went, early afternoon but not very clean. The showers and locker area is mixed men and women and absolutely filthy, the toilets disgusting too. I wanted a token for the locker and was told there were none and suggested to take all my belongings, coats, shoes, towels etc, to the pool side! However, you can use a £1 coin to close the locker, someone used a 20 cents in theirs. I asked reception to help me changing two 50 p coins for a pound and the new receptionist gave me a token, evidently the first one couldn't bother looking for one.

Fantastic experience: Lovely customer service Lovely people

Fantastic experience: Fantastic resource, fantastic Pool and the staff are amazing

Positive experience: Old school pool, empty during the day, decent changing rooms/showers, highly recommended.

Fantastic experience: We use Cally pool often and the staff are very friendly and go out of their way to help, even kindly letting me use the little pool recently, when the pools were closed for a gala. The training pool is a perfect temperature and depth for young children too. It’s a lovely centre and we really value it!

Fantastic experience: Just wanted to say how polite and supportive Sherena was when I came in the other day , such exceptional customer service and always a bright ray of sunshine

Fantastic experience: Cally Pool is an amazing leisure centre. I always receive great customer service and they are so friendly to customers. They are great with children and the elderly too.

Fantastic experience: Had an amazing experience at Cally Pool had a great session at the gym and went to use all the other facilities. Great customer service from the staff at the front desk. Definitely recommend to my friends and family.

Positive experience: The whole process of booking online is daunting and frustrating for those of us who don't like online,much preferred it as before in person ,I just started last week swimming lessons via swim doctor adult over 18 Thursday evening before they did weekend which I much prefer so more choice ,there is additional questions I have which I hope to be answered when I go there for my swim class this week. ,Regarding teacher absolutely brilliant,very thorough and goes above and beyond and our class nice size for proper teaching so we get that additional individual attention so really enjoying it as it was before COVID since my last lesson.

Positive experience: Made to purpose. Nothing bad nothing great

Negative experience: The showers are terrible! When taking the shower the water comes out only very very hot water and you do not have any option to regulate the temperature. There is no mixer tap option. Absolutely terrible! Please change them, so that we can be able to mix hot and cold water to take a shower without burning. Thank you

Negative experience: Really dirty changing area the last two times I went here. Vandalised cubicles. Scalding showers too hot to use. Lane hoggers in too small swimming lanes. The ever present sand at the bottom of the pool. This place is very badly managed. I won't be back.

Fantastic experience: The pool is clean. They have excellent swim teachers. The main reason I love this pool is that it’s not overly crowded as opposed to other pools that teach children. Most of all the stuff are very calm. Generally you get a relaxed feeling in this place.

Fantastic experience: This is a very old but incredible place ..still very good and the swimming teachers are incredible

Fantastic experience: Nice pool

Fantastic experience: Amazing place amazing beautiful person... I love to be there....me and my baby daughter I'm enjoying all the time

Positive experience: It was nice, friendly swimmers. The staff are good as well. The pools were neat with the right amount of chlorine. Lovely place for a family hangout.

Negative experience: Pool too cold, changing rooms and bathroom needs regular cleaning.

Fantastic experience: Really nice and helpful staff. Needs updating though.

Positive experience: Staff very helpful- changing rooms could be swept more often

Fantastic experience: Brill!

Positive experience: Swimming, was also splendid, but the hygine isnt well. Once you have gone inside the changing room, the floor is wet with water, that is brown, that brings a high chande of getting a verucca. So I think that they should hire cleaners. Thx for the great swim!

Fantastic experience: I love this place! It has such a family atmosphere, is warm and always so welcoming. How lucky we are to have such a supportive place for elders in the community, teaching kids to swim and accommodating everyone in between. (I’m so sorry to say there seems to have been something odd with a change of management in the past few weeks which has meant regulars have actually left but hopefully this will be sorted soon. We all need to keep this valuable place of happiness and wellness. We don’t need people alienated if they don’t book ahead on their phone, get told off for not following new bizarre rules or met with a grumpy manager. Oh well, let’s cross our fingers and hope for the best). Don’t we all love our Cally Pool!!!

Negative experience: Poor gym barely any equipment.

Positive experience: My daughter does swimming here and has learned so much I really like the teachers especially Liam he goes above and beyond for the kids. In terms of front of house staff Farakhan and Dillon and the lady who works mornings do their absolute best to cater to our needs and are extremely helpful. Cally pool looses a star because the new GM is dismissive and has no clue how to talk to people, I’m absolutely appalled and can see a downturn in service in the past couple of weeks since he has been there.

Negative experience: Wonderful staff 5* and new dictator zero*. No interest in what customers want - just demands obedience. Customer satisfaction is replaced with fear. This was a really friendly centre; now more like a prison! Oppressive! Poor lifeguards are forced to become cleaners. Surely, anybody with some intelligence would employ a full time cleaner and buy some decent cleaning machines. No! Better to inflict a misfit on us. GLL appears to adopt a laissez faire approach and a misogynistic tyrant rules. Instead of fulfilling their commitment to improving locals’ experience, company is only concerned with the bottom line - more money!!

Positive experience: Very pleasant colleague on Front Desk..friendly & helpful. Only 1 family changing cubicle seen...had to change baby on knee. Looked quite clean.

Fantastic experience: If I ever want to set up a hospitality / retail business I'm stealing all the staff. Only improvement would be a coat hanger in the gym.

Positive experience: Cally Pool is 5 mins from my home, it’s so important to me - my mental and physical wellbeing - to be able to go swimming so conveniently. It’s a good facility with excellent friendly managers. However… the timetabling is very poor and enormously frustrating. Clearly groups that pay well, schools and clubs are prioritised. I understand the bottom line is important but Better are a not for profit org who are there to ‘serve the local community’ and consistently as a local, I feel i am over looked in favour of the groups sessions. All I want from my local pool, is a consistent timetable that allows me to swim enjoyably at regular times. Please could you protect early morning sessions until 9:30am at least for local swimmers who rely on routine for their mental health in particular.

Fantastic experience: Very friendly staff, lovely pool and changing area very well kept

Positive experience: The pool is average, but the changing facilities were not up to standards and were quite dirty. On a busy Saturday afternoon, the facilities were quite crowded. However, the friendly and welcoming attitude of the receptionist was a positive experience and elevates the rating from 2 to 3 stars.

Negative experience: Changing rooms and toilets were disgusting

Positive experience: It's about the cheapest you can find in London for a pool and a gym, but major disappointment for the sauna being advertised but actually not being available for the foreseeable future. The rest of the facilities are basic but functional.

Positive experience: 2 large pools with a reasonable number of changing rooms and showers (all unisex). The gym is small but I hardly see people using it. Main attraction are the pools. There’s street parking and you can pay via telephone or RingGo app. For 45mins it’s about £5 so better to walk there or use public transport if you can.

Positive experience: Nice staff quite clean , but i remeber this place from when i was about 5 now 35 and its not changed at all same decor only thing thats changed is the changing rooms

Positive experience: Better, the company are awful but the staff here are lovely and very good.

Negative experience: For those aiming a half-decent swim as a serious exercise, stay away from this pool.

Fantastic experience: First of all, we would like to thank the very, very friendly and courteous staff. My son and I are from Germany and we are on holiday in London. After three full days, we wanted to relax. There are two pools. One for little non-swimmers and one where you can just swim your lengths. My son then went to the in-house gym. Cally Pool & Gym, we recommend.

Fantastic experience: Great pool for adults and children. There is actually two pools. One is for lanes and the other is for families and play.

Negative experience: The spa section, if you can call it that is absolutely disgusting. The person at the door will give you a code to enter what looks like a broom closet with some cleaning apparatus and machinery blocking the door. When you make it into that hole of a room, the area is damp and there are dead insects everywhere on the floor. The steam room was broken and not in use on the day that I went which left a small sauna that had dead insects all over the floor. This place needs a good cleaning and better management. Could be much nicer if there weren't insects everywhere and cleaning machines left lying around the entire area.

Positive experience: The Swimming pool is smaller than expected and the changing rooms are DISGUSTING. They should really make efforts

Fantastic experience: They provide an excellen customer service and has high quality facilities

Negative experience: Please avoid booking sessions before 1pm because lessons are still in progress. The building isn't being maintained properly and the pool cover is in the pool causing less space to swim. The instructor was continuously shouting at children today because they were going over to the teaching side. When I approached the lifeguard he couldn’t answer any of my questions and stared at me like I wasn’t speaking english. I asked another lifeguard named Jack and he explained the issue regarding building maintenance, however, he proceeded to laugh at me when I asked his colleague’s name and wasn’t given it. I spoke with the manager Joanna who was very helpful, however, this problem needs resolving ASAP!

Negative experience: Just called better gym to try to find out how to book an ordinary swim session at the pool on Caledonian Road, as a non member. The person who answered seemed to be miles away from the microphone and was answering my questions with 3 words max! I still don’t have any relevant or helpful info and I really don’t understand why this phone call and the process of enquiry was so difficult!!! I guess I won’t be using that pool for a swim! Better Gym… do BETTER!

Fantastic experience: Local swimming baths which I used to go to often. Planning on starting to swim again. Nice pools friendly staff.

Positive experience: Great swimming pool. Great teachers. But 10+ kids in a small lane is bit crawded with only 1 teacher

Fantastic experience: Great place good fun do recommend getting some slides for a diving board

Negative experience: Staff is great and the place is nice, however it is really dirty for a swimming pool, I stopped going. A deep clean would be much appreciated!

Negative experience: Possibly the worst pool I have ever visited within Better membership. Nobody checked me in, swam in a pool full of children, then found out that I wasn't meant to be there as it was closed to adult public. The staff didn't seem very attentive to customers, when tried to ask some information they kept on talking and totally ignored me. Old building, not looked after, very dirty. My first and last visit.

Fantastic experience: That is the pool that I have a pool lesson the pool and the teacher is amazing love it

Positive experience: Nice pool.

Fantastic experience: Really nice staff

Positive experience: Nice staff and warm pool. Could be cleaner...

Fantastic experience: Great and fun,meeting new people and the diversity of the community of Islington Borough.

Fantastic experience: Great for a.swim. Just wish MARKET ROAD had a pool.

Fantastic experience: Five star only for the blonde receptionest, very professional way of dealing with the issues and always gives us beautiful smile ☺

Fantastic experience: Staff are always nice and friendly facilities are very clean

Negative experience: I have cancer and require treatment i had to cancel my membership without using my membership because I have bone cancer they still won't give my membership money back a utter disgrace they won't even answer my emails or calls

Fantastic experience: Nice and quiet in main pool had a good hour to myself

Negative experience: Closed apparently? Nobody answers the better gym hotline which is also closed lol waste of time

Negative experience: Friendly staff, run down installations and for some reason most visitors and carers don't wear a face covering inside.

Fantastic experience: Took my daughter to do a trial swimming lesson she enjoyed it

Fantastic experience: Went to callypool today at 3 and was greeted by a lovely lady who looked after us. Even though she was short staffed today she done an amazing job and made us feel very welcome. Because of her great customer service I have to give 5 stars today.

Fantastic experience: Lovely little pool with friendly staff

Fantastic experience: Clean

Negative experience: Should I open the baby pool for baby kids too many swimmers up and down the lines

Fantastic experience: I have been using Cally pool for a few years. I have no complaints to make. All I can say the staff are very helpful and kind. A massive shout out to the beautiful Sherena. Her kindness, helpfulness, her massive smile, makes it all worthwhile when I get to the pool at 7am. I hope she gets the recognition she deserves. Don't change beautiful lady, you are just awesome.

Fantastic experience: Customer service was impeccable by the front reception sherena she's so vibrant

Positive experience: Many Showers out of order and it really could be cleaner, but a hugely important local resource, which we all appreciate. The move (years ago) towards shared Showers (male/female) and shared changing rooms with cubicles is hard to understand, impossible to agree with.

Fantastic experience: 5* for sherene love her, always smiling making me and my son feel welcome helps us if needed, amazing customer service.

Positive experience: I Always go there for my child swimming lessons. Very professional and helpful. I like caly pool. Good job guys.

Fantastic experience: It is fantastic the staff very friendly

Negative experience: Better gym is managing the re-openning terribly. They start charging me for membership while the facility I use remains closed. And they blame me for not "refreezing" my membership. Their customer service is horrible! They just don't recognize their own mistakes.

Fantastic experience: Good

Negative experience: Dirtiest pool I've been to in a long time. Great for the community but needs a huge clean up. Pool water was full of phlegm, toenails and sand! Hopefully the kids pool was better...

Fantastic experience: Great pool, clean water in the pool, changing rooms are spacious and clean, friendly and helpful staff. I will be a regular customer

Positive experience: Good pool. Plenty of space for an early morning swim Friendly staff.

Positive experience: Needs updating. Not very clean.

Positive experience: Not the best could be alot cleaner very slippery surfaces as the water needs to be cleaned of more often.

Positive experience: Lovely staff

Negative experience: It's good but there are mostly lessons on and I think if there were both lessons and free swimming in would rate a five

Positive experience: It was ok. Not a bad pool but not amazing

Positive experience: Pros: Good value for money, pool usually not busy after 1830, good opening times Cons: Cleanliness is definitely to be improved, overshoes MUST be worn

Fantastic experience: Amazing. I took my kids to my water aerobics class and it was great! The staff is great and so is the actual pools.

Negative experience: Very unqualified people at reception . It’s nightmare to cancel your membership : had to call them a few tones and everyone was telling me different things as it’s not option to do it online .

Fantastic experience: This place is clean and bright. The staff are very friendly and the whole atmosphere is very welcoming.

Positive experience: Shower area is mixed. have 4 cubicles 2 disabled ones. all showers have problems, water not adjustable comes cold. typical ones don't flow no because of the disabled one if that is on disabled one by itself near the locker room toilet flush is a problem has been like that for over a year both disabled toilets have have adjustable hand shower which are damaged they get temporary ones which break. showers have flies especially the separate disabled toilet one. Swimming pools are ok kids pool area has only one side for sitting across the width so if your kids are doing lesson on the opposite side You can't see them unless you are in the reception area looking through the glass in a 45-degree angle. People are good generally. The lessons for kids is a policy problem with better gym. Note: My kids have used cally Highbury Holloway kings x over the years. Cally used from winter 17 to Jan 19. as parents can put kids in a higher level that they are not. and the rest of the kids suffer time and group wise as the kids wait for them. also instructor can't put them in the correct level nor suggest to the kid. as an instructor mentioned the policy reason is not to make kids lose confidence ect. So the parents lose out money kids find it frustrating There is a disparity in instructor teaching abilities, paying attention to each kids individually and correcting, showing them. The best teachers are the one who will show and correct in the pool. If they have good communication skills and come down to kid level.

Positive experience: Kinda small but functional. Its busy. Snack machine in small foyer. Kids swimming classes & other activities in kids small pool. U can watch ur kids at all times in pool through a glass window wall if u dont want to join in. Separate large adults pool, never seen it without 'lanes'. Compact gym looks out onto pool. Misted windows for privacy on entrance side, good if u dont like being oggled by strangers entering or passing the premises. Changin rooms have lockers, mirrors, hairdryer etc, BUT are realllly freeeeeezing !!! & feels manic when kids runnin round in there to keep warm !! No parking facilities, but Limited Pay & display parking around. Bus stop 30 secs away. Shops & food places all along the same road.

Negative experience: Did not enjoy the overly wet/flooded change rooms. For price value it’s good, but very poor for an overall pleasant gym experience.