School Days - memories & outings

Yes, red leather, a long time since I saw a pair of those I think I wore a couple of pairs out but then I recall a new fad with giant springs on the bottom, two springs on each and you sprung about They were more fun than stilts but not as versatile as the Jacko's.

Hi Philip We travelled down through Stow-on-the-Wold, Malmesbury, Cirencester, Melksham, Frome, Shepton Mallet, Street, Tiverton, Crediton, Hatherleigh, Holsworthy, Stratton, Camelford, Wadebridge, Padstow!!! Not sure if that's the correct order, but isn't it amazing what you can remember after so many years!!! My father always obtained a route from the AA which basically avoided Bristol, Taunton, Exeter and Okehampton. We seemed to travel a fair bit on the Fosse and the A361. Regards, Beesman.

Morning everyone, Are there many skateboards whizzing around your areas, not so sure about where you are Foxcote. Apparently it looks like the first mode of transport in these parts before reaching the 'driving school' age. You can be walking along to fetch the paper and whizz there they go and then they pass you on the way back. No fatalities though. I do believe the juvenile crime rate rises though which is a sure sign the little darlings are on holiday.

Hi Beesman, When my parents lived in Bodmin, I did travel the North Cornwall route as I called it a few times, but like you, nearly always the Fosse until Bath.

That smell you get when dry earth is rained on is called 'petrichor', and it's a byproduct of bacteria in the soil and oils from plants - the rain triggers its release. The name is derived from the name of fluid that runs through the veins of Greek gods.

At the start of the summer holidays, my pride and joy was to be bought a brand new pair of "blue baseball boots". After wearing shoes every day for the rest of the year, these were as light as a feather and supple. With these boots on you would be off, from Lower Ford St I would walk to Coombe Woods and then on to Brandon Woods, then back home for tea time. Clean as a new pin when I left but filthy dirty by the time I got home, mainly covered in green from climbing the trees. Other walks would be to Tile Hill Wood or Canley, never thought anything of walking the distances, time just flew. Playing hopscotch with the pavement as the board, swinging on a rope tied to the arm on the gaslamp, which no one took down, tig and its variations, ie, off ground tig, football in the street with no cars around. War games with bits of wood as guns, finding an old pram with its wheels intact then pushing all the way home hoping you were not mugged by some older children who would take it as their prize. If it got home it would then be stripped and turned into a trolley. Use it down Devils Dungeon and smash it to bits, play in the Swanswell, fall in the Swanswell, scrumping, building dens, playing in the Sherbourne, falling in the Sherbourne, every time I went out I always got back filthy. Going on holiday to Pembroke Dock, where my dad was born, either by car or coach, at least 8hrs to get there by either. We came up in the best times, the things we all did then would now be classed as stealing, trespass or not obeying health and safety. At least we were street wise because we played in them and used them for walking every where instead of being driven around in a four by four. We fell off the roundabouts, the swings and slides with no rubber tiles to brace the fall, instead we had grazed knees with stones sticking out, lumps and bumps on our heads, but to be honest I was pleased to go back to school at the end of the holiday. To see my other mates but mostly because I was back into my shoes as I had worn my baseball boots out. Oh well, another pair next year.

Hello all I spent many happy days at the Coventry Co-op Holiday Camp at Rhyl, North Wales, we would go for a week in the summer throughout the 60s and early 70s, it was an old army camp that backed onto the beach. Basic holiday by today's standards, but great times.

Hello & welcome cv6, to our forum I am CV6 too! I enjoyed a holiday in Eastbourne once, courtesy of Coventry retail traders association. The thing is, we made our own enjoyment & they were good times. Foxcote mentioned the stripy sun curtains in Coventry in her opening post & I just wonder if the beach windbreaks were made of the left-over same humbug material.

As a kid in Coventry, when people were asked where they were going on holiday they would say "The Broads - Broad Street, Broad Lane and Broadgate".

We had similar holidays but we always went to Sunnyvale which I think is a different park. It is the last one before the bridge. It is still there now.

I remember the Co-op camp very well. Us young bucks decided to have a piggy back race through the camp carrying young ladies. I was well out in front when the girl on my back suddenly jumped off (or so I thought). There was a reason for her sudden departure however, she was at the same level as a washing line as we ran through the camp and the poor girl was nearly garroted by it. I also remember the football match at the end of each week when the men dressed as women and vice versa. A very cheap holiday but good fun.

Hi all As the last few hours of the school summer holidays ebb by, I am sure many of us, whether parents or grandparents, will be apprehensive as regards the futures of our youngsters. A first school, new school, or just a new year, or even the experience of the sixth form, I wonder what our youngsters will be writing about on their future forums, just as many of us remember our times back then. I do, as I am sure that we all do, wish them all well!

It brought back memories yesterday. On your trips to North Wales does any one remember stopping off at lay-by just past Weston Park to buy boxes of broken biscuits? We took the grandchildren to Cosford yesterday and there is a van still selling boxes of broken biscuits in that lay-by. They have been selling them there for nearly 50 years. Nice to know some things don't change.

Growing up the 60's on a new estate in Bulkington myself and the kids aged between 6-13 would go on bike rides with picnics to Pailton, Monks Kirby and Withybrook. 6 years old!!!! Wouldn't let your kids do that nowadays, different world and different time back then. Great days and memories. If it was raining we'd stay in and watch programmes, White Horses, Robinson Crusoe and Champion the Wonder Horse.

Apart from two weeks abroad, I spent a lot of time during the week on roller skates in front of the Hipswell Highway shops. The family had not long taken over the newsagents from Emery, and I wasn't allowed to go too far because I had the condition Petit Mal. It was as much as I could do to be allowed roller skates. Days were long and boring, and school was not welcome at the end of the holidays either. Hated school with a passion. The medication for Petit Mal used at the time knocked me out so much, the school teachers saw me as lazy and stupid and were never slow to remind me. My best memories other than seeing stuff abroad was getting a banana popsicle from D-Di on visits to my maternal grandparents on Sewall Highway, and my grandmother used to get Clarona (cherryade) from the Corona lorry, oh and delivering newsprint to the chip shop on HH. I also delivered the old boy's pack of Kensitas cigarettes too, for which I would be given a small bag of batter bits. See? It wasn't all bad, just most of it.