Awesome experience for swimmers or athletes of any sort, will teach you more then you will ever…read moreexpect!!

Honestly, I am terrified of swimming in oceans and any time in excess of more than 3 minutes in…read moredeep water (without being able to eventually touch my feet or latch on to something). It's been a fear that I always held off on overcoming (mainly because I didn't feel comfortable) and I know that it is a skill that I will want to have. I was introduced to DEF, but was insecure about attending a class because I'm not athletic (but not in terrible shape) and did not want to embarrass myself. The team here was EXTREMELY welcoming and they will help assess your level. You also feel safe with the experienced instructors. This has been a huge change than just going to the gym, and I'm excited to get healthier and strengthen my water confidence.

Anna at Hall Swim Academy is an excellent teacher…read more Two years ago, my son (who was 7 at the time) was going to another swim school and was doing ok but advancing slowly. As part of that school's safety training, they threw him in the water wearing street clothes. He was doing ok for about 30 seconds but then panicked and started to sink so one of the teachers had to jump in and pull him out. (It was partially my fault since I mistakenly had him wear long pants that absorbed water). Anyhow, he freaked out and got very scared. We continued to go to that school for several more weeks but he stagnated with his training and the teacher became frustrated and tried to push him too hard so he had a melt down. Fast forward two years, I started taking him to the Hall Swim Academy west LA location about 2 months ago and he started trying again to learn how to swim with Anna. Anna is extremely kind and patient with kids. She demonstrates what she wants him to do and corrects mistakes in his floating and swim strokes and has him repeat as necessary. She is able to recognize how much to push and when to give him more space and repeats instructions as necessary. He loves going to swim class with Anna and is motivated to learn so he can swim with his friends at summer camp. Yesterday, he had two major breakthroughs. He spent most of the class in the pool without wearing goggles which he previously refused to do. Then, on his own, he decided he wanted to try the swim test. So, he put on street clothes over his swim suit, jumped in the water, floated on his back for 20 seconds and then easily swam to the side of the pool and climbed out on his own. He was so proud of himself for overcoming his fear and is now looking forward to his next class with Anna. I am very grateful to Anna for her kindness, professionalism, excellent teaching skills and being such a good motivator. Thank you!!

Both of our children had such a wonderful experience with Swim Hall Academy! All the teachers are…read moretop-notch and wonderful with children. We can't recommend them enough.

This gym sucks. The quality of the machines are horrible. And if you are going to spend the 25+ a…read moremonth you would atleast want a fixed flatbench which they dont even have.

This review is for their pumpkin patch on the corner of sunset and temescal Canyon. There were a…read morelot of variety of pumpkins here! Maybe 5 different kinds and they all were scattered about in a sort of organized chaos in size and type. There also was a big hay area that kids could play and a Jack'o Lantern sign where you can stick your head through and take a picture. Luckily too, even though it was in the High 80's that day, they had most of the patch situated in shade near the little ply pro there. I wasn't sure how people carried their pumpkins to their cars as they had to park pretty far away. I luckily had my husband do it since I picked a pretty large pumpkin. There was a few people other than the girl at the cashier table so maybe they were there to help just in case? I dunno. The only thing weird about this trip was when we brought the pumpkin up to pay, they put it in front of a height chart and it is prices in increments of inches. Our came out to $11. But without explanation, she just told us it was $23. Not that that was crazy expensive or anything , it was just hard to understand where they got their price from. I know a bunch of it has to go to the YMCA, so of course we wouldn't even second guess the price. I just wish they explained it a bit better. Its more funny weird than a bad experience. Overall, I thought the place was cute and a great place to take your child to pick out a pumpkin.

oh my gosh we love them SO much. Our 6 year old has a genetic deletion as well as an autism…read morediagnosis, I can just gush about how kind and caring as sweet they are with her. she LOVES to go swimming and asks about it all the time!! I can't recommend them enough.

We receive swimming lessons through the regional center, and Souri from One With Water has been…read moreamazing with my son. She's patient, professional, and great with kids with autism. It did take a few months and a lot of follow-up before we were assigned an instructor, but once Souri started coming weekly, it's been a 5-star experience. Be patient -- it's worth the wait!

Clean facilities and really friendly staff. This gym also has many different classes and…read moreexperiences to offer.

Parking is ridiclous! How dare they charge you to park in that terrible lot that you can't get in…read moreand out of when it's busy. Staff is rude and dismissive. Lobby smelled as if there was a gas leak for a week when I mentioned it to the annoyed woman at the desk, without looking up at me, she said I don't smell anything got up and walked away.

I brought my 4-year-old son to Aqua Buddies for swim lessons. At first, everything seemed fine…read more During his initial lesson, he worked with one instructor and learned basic skills like blowing bubbles, which was a positive start. However, as we continued, each lesson was with a different instructor, and that lack of consistency made my son increasingly uncomfortable. At his age, familiarity matters, and it became clear he wasn't settling in the way I had hoped. What ultimately led me to write this review, though, was not the instructors--it was the customer service. My interactions with the scheduler/representative regarding scheduling, missed days, and invoices were unpleasant and rigid. There was very little kindness or willingness to work with me, and the communication felt cutthroat rather than supportive. Because of this inflexibility, my son essentially missed out on continued lessons. Instead of working with me as a parent trying to navigate life with two young kids and a disabled husband, I felt pushed out over a missed appointment. In retrospect, I now see how much that experience negatively impacted my son's relationship with the water. I'm writing this while watching my son thrive at Water Wings, where he is happy, confident, and excited to learn. Seeing the difference has made me realize just how behind he became due to how things were handled at Aqua Buddies. Thankfully, there are other options in this city. I truly wish Aqua Buddies placed more emphasis on compassion, flexibility, and customer service--especially when working with young children and families who may need understanding, not rigidity.

We had a great experience with Aqua Buddies. I found them on…read moreYelp when I was looking for a swim instructor to come to my home to teach a toddler some basic swim skills. We had a lovely instructor that was kind and patient. Unfortunately, our little one did not take to the lessons and we had to call it quits. Aqua Buddies were very understanding and offered a refund for the lessons we did not use. Next year when our little one is older, we will be calling again to set up lessons.

worse scheduling and terrible communication. would not recommend for swim lessons. Took 4 months to…read morefulfill 10 swim lessons. My child still doesn't know how to swim. waste of money for $70 per class for group sessions.

Amy (the director) is super helpful and she went out of her way to find a time that was working for…read moreus. We had one lesson with Shawn and immediately decided to sign up for 16 more... Shawn is such a great coach. He's engaging, calm and poised. He seamlessly redirect kids to stay on task and find fun and goal-driven activities. He really pushes the limits of what kids can do, while being reassuring and supportive. Just awesome coach and director!

Ceci has been amazing with my son. He's special needs and her patience along with encouragement is…read moreamazing!

Saskia is a sweetheart! She's patient and kind and our little guy is progressing along in such a…read moreshort time. Oh, and she's also very flexible with scheduling and that makes it so much easier for our busy family :)

Mediocre at best, but mostly just terrible. The instrutor's were unprepared and gave tiny objects…read moreto my baby class I had organized at my house that were choking objects. Little lizards and tiny plastic toys that all immediately went into the mouth. They obviously had no idea what appropriate teachings tools were for small children. This place just wants your money and you have to pay upfront for everything in a group of ''sessions'. Truly a waste of money other than getting to hang out with my friends and their kids. Sorely regret paying over a thousand dollars for the 'actor' that taught our class and talked about himself the whole time and the lady that picked her scabs on her face in my pool full of 1 year olds. Barf. Terrible experience.

Came here debating on upgrading my Equinox membership to include the Destination Locations with…read morePacific Palisades really being the Prized Location among the others like the Sports Club or Century City. First the negatives: The Parking isn't terrible but it will slow you down and take up your "time limit" of 2.5 hrs, You have to drive slooooow. The spaces are all compact, I drive a Model Y and it was tight in the curves to go between floors and the parking spaces. There is only one elevator but I believe you can access the parking levels by taking the stairs or entering from different floors. The water pressure is very weak in the water fountains and the showers. I saw some complaints about accessing different rooms but it wasn't bad at all it's like 20 feet and if it's raining you shouldn't really notice if you're already wet from sweat. If you are afraid of water then not sure what to tell you, you may want to spend your membership money on help with that. Equinox is notorious for stairs and although there are no stairs to go UP to the locker rooms like other locations there are stairs that go up to go inside the gym. Once inside the stairs either go down into the locker rooms or up between levels. You're at the gym, the stairs shouldn't be an issue for you, embrace the stairs, enjoy the stairs. Lastly it's a new gym and 2 of the cold plunges weren't working and the parking validation didn't work but was easily able to press a button, speak and view a live person on the screen and be granted access to leave. The positives: The Views are amazing, ease of access to be in or out of the gym if you wanted to take a walk in between sets to get some Sun. The equipment is all new and the gym is spotless. The crew were everywhere cleaning and making sure everything was stocked and on working order. The bathrooms were very nice but had limited stalls which wasn't a problem for me but could be an issue at some point. The showers, steam room and co-ed Sauna were dope. My conclusion, I'm upgrading my Membership and enjoying this location and all others. If you can afford it, I highly recommend it.

I recently made my way out to the newest Equinox location in Southern California because on their…read morewebsite it said this location opened on 12/20/24. Unfortunately, that was not the case as the front desk staff said they ran into some code issues that they were still working out with the city. However, they were nice enough to let me tour the club and here are my impressions. First off, being that will be a brand new club this would take over as the nicest Equinox location in Southern California. The club is spread out over 3 floors. You enter on the 2nd floor with direct access from the parking garage. More on that later. The aesthetics are very much in line with the current Equinox club aesthetic, albeit with brighter wood tones to emphasize its location right across from the beach and the Pacific Ocean. The 2nd floor has offices and the juice bar. Down the stairs to the first level is where the Men's and Women's locker rooms are as well as the new Recovery Area with a very large co-ed sauna and ice baths. It'll be interesting to see how this location handles the co-ed area. Up stairs to the 3rd floor and you see the requisite cardio area, free weights, one squat rack and machines. The cycling studio is on the side. Upon first glance, the layout of the weights floor felt like it was going to be a problem. It was very small and for a new gym to only have one set of free weights and one squat rack, that's going to be an issue, but upon further discovery there's a whole other section that you can access by going out onto the terrace covered in astroturf set up for weights and sled work and an outdoor stretching area around the corner. There was a larger room that had another cardio area, this time with numerous Woodway Treadmills as well as new weights, another rack of free weights, barbells, dumbbells, squat racks, Smith Machines, etc... The private pilates studio and group fitness studio are also located on this side. That said, I understand they were working with existing space, but it does feel odd to have separate rooms that you would have to access through exterior corridors rather than one unified space. I'm interested to see how this layout will handle weather and volume as there's no access to the locker facilities from the larger weights room. Parking is available underground with the entrance behind the building, but be careful as the ramp up and down were very narrow with numerous scrapes on the ramp walls. Parking for Equinox on the upper parking floors so that's nice, but the spaces are tight. Overall, I believe this is still considered a select location, but depending on how it does it might get bumped up to a SoCal All Access tier, but only time will tell.