Sweet Memories of Childhood Summers

 

My love affair with the sea began with our first family jaunts to the East coast of Yorkshire; living in Leeds you don’t see much sea, so my two sisters and I eagerly looked forward to our annual fortnight in Filey.

 

 

 I remember clearly the excitement of setting off for an idyllic couple of weeks, once the car boot was packed to bursting we were off, my father driving, as a rule, singing silly songs as our mother pointed out to us cows and sheep grazing in the passing fields.

 

 

The three of sat happily in the back, each of us hoping we would be the one to have that first glimpse of the sea glittering in the distance, upon which we would jump up and down, joyfully exclaiming ‘The sea, the sea!’

After many ‘Are we there yet?’ we spotted the sign for Malton, and a few miles later passed by York, we knew we were nearly there.

 

 

 Invariably my father rented the same quaint bungalow, adjacent to the sea, for two weeks in August, owned by a couple of ladies of a certain age, the Andrassi sisters, who lived in a large, square white house on the cliffs, overlooking the sea.

It had a large, wild garden, which ended at the cliff’s edge; I distinctly remember the man next door who had a wonderful pond in his garden, full of the largest goldfish I have ever seen.

 He would call to us at their feeding time, allowing each of us to take a handful of fish food, which we scattered upon the surface of the water, which would churn and bubble as the hungry fish surfaced to suck the flakes into their wide, gaping mouths.

 

 

The bungalow was a treasure chest of secrets, the Andrassi sisters must have lived there at some point, cupboards and drawers were full of their forgotten, maybe unwanted belongings, which we secretly inspected, always being sure to leave them just as we had found them.

This sweet little bungalow was also rather primitive, an outside loo and no bathroom; how did we cope? We had to make do with a quick wash down at the kitchen tap, and ‘chamber pots’ in the two bedrooms, which were squashed under the eaves, my parents in one, the three of us in the other, where we wearily fell into the lumpy beds, to fall asleep instantly to dream sweet dreams of the days ahead.

The weather was not always on our side, English summers and all that, I remember being on the beach in my coat, and we have this priceless picture of my youngest sister wearing a jumper under her bathing costume!

 

 

All three of us wore that bathing suit at some time or another and our cousin wore it before us, it was so stretchy, it grew with us!

 We spent every day on the beach, building sand castles, collecting shells and of course swimming, usually in a freezing sea!

 

 

I yearned for a shiny tin beach bucket but my Father always bought us the rubber ones, they lasted longer he said, wouldn’t rust with the sea water.

 

 

 The rubber spade which accompanied the bucket, was more than useless, too soft, it just didn’t dig into the sand like the tin ones.

 

 

I never did acquire a tin bucket, and I can’t even satisfy my yearning now, through buying one for my granddaughter, they are all made of plastic.

 

 

 Every year my father bought a kite, it was meant to be for us three girls but I remember he always seemed to commandeer it!

The tail had to be weighted properly with pebbles, to make it fly better and he had a special bit of wood, it looked like the end of a broom handle, that he wound the string around.

Did he search out and take this bit of wood with him every year?

He would charge up and down the beach trying to launch it with three little girls running behind him, screeching with excitement!

 

 

We had nets for shrimping in rock pools; I can’t ever remember catching any, and there was a new sunhat every year, not that we would catch sunstroke from the English sun!

 

 

Late afternoon, after a magical day, we packed up and headed back to the bungalow, to prepare for our evening strolls, apart from a quick swill down in the kitchen sink now and again, we spent the whole two weeks covered in a crusty layer of sea salt, what was the point of washing it off; we would only be back in the sea again tomorrow!

 

 

The evenings were spent in the centre of Filey.

A special treat was to have an evening meal in the “Corner café”, this made us feel quite posh, other evenings it was fish and chips in the paper sat on the promenade, but most evenings we had eaten before heading for town.

 

 

Another treat was having a ride on the little train that ran all around Primrose Valley,we were aboard every year!

My Father would give us a few coins to “Get rid of” in Corrigan’s amusement arcade and we always, always but always,  had a “99” ice cream, a holiday wasn’t a holiday without the totally British ’99’ ice cream cone!

 

 

We took day trips out from Filey to nearby Scarborough or Bridlington, I can still smell the fishing boats tied up at Bridlington harbour!

 

 

All year my sisters and I had saved our pocket money for the holiday in Filey.

 One year I bought my Mother a present, some scent in a bottle shaped like a tiny thatched cottage.

She was delighted with it, once home it was kept on her dressing table. I secretly used it now and again, topping it up with water so that she wouldn’t know. When she died, I found it in one of her drawers; she had kept it all those years.

 

 

The final day was unfailingly, sad, but we did look forward to seeing our friends again, we had gifts to give them, a stick of rock or some unidentifiable animal made from sea shells, sometimes a gilt bracelet that turned green within a week.

 Once home, the rest of the summer was spent sticking our fingers in the tar that had melted at the edge of the road, if it had been a particularly hot day.

Playing in various gardens, riding our bikes or just laying on the lawn making daisy chains and worst of all, going to bed while it was still light, it never seemed to get dark on English summer evenings!

One particular  summer’s evening sticks in my mind: our Mother took us for a walk in the woods adjoining my grandmother’s house, stepping close to an old stone wall, to stroke a horse , she trod on a wasp’s nest.

It was as if all hell had been let loose, all of us were stung: any part of us not covered by clothing was covered with stings!

My Grandmother had just the remedy, gentian violet, she more or less swabbed us down with it, and gentian violet takes a long time to wear off!

 

 

I am so thankful for these memories, whatever we did in our childhood summers, we were always outside, I am thankful we had no computers, laptops, ipods, tablets or mobile phones, and thankful that my children had their carefree childhoods, before technology had raised its head, to rob them of it.

 

 

 I hope my children’s memories of their childhood summers are as happy as mine are, for sure they will remember the beach, for that is where they were raised!

 

More Yorkshire, childhood memories:

The 1970s – Growing up in Leeds, Yorkshire, England.

A 1970s Christmas in Leeds – Yorkshire – England

The 1970s – A Decade of Decadence