There was a curious radio program today which suggested that young people should not travel overseas.I think the thesis was that basically you are "too young to appreciate the experience" and, more than that, you might be ruined and never learn to settle down.
I will get to that later on (part the fourth perhaps)
But as a boy it was wonderful to grow up in West Cumberland ( the Western Lake District) we used to go to the beach at St Bees (where my Dad had lived as a boy and my Great Uncle and Aunt still lived ...he had been both the bank manager and a lighthouse operator....!) and then we stayed at Braystones...just a bit further down the coast. Coastally beautiful!
How we swam I don't know as it was the Irish Sea, by Australian standards it was probably colder than even the south of Tasmania.! As I reflect, I realise that at least one of our holiday 'houses' probably did not have electricity nor running water (we used to go to the Well to fill buckets!). But I think we got up at 6 or 7 spent the day at the beach, picked mushrooms, built sandcastles, swam...caught crabs, picked cuvvins...( a sea snail which you picked and soaked and cooked...Yum! [let us not however begin to think about the discharge from the Windscales Nuclear Reactor...which meant that Sellafield was discharging waste water which may or may not have been tainted by nuclear waste....might explain why I have three brains!]...but we enjoyed them...Cumbrian escargots)The main picture above is of the wonderful Campsite that the Scouts developed at Ennerdale. Many of my holidays as a teenage boy were as a member of that organisation. I am really happy that I had the opportunity to be both a Cub and a Scout.
The formal campsite, but also rough camping in fields and on mountainsides was very enjoyable. And is etched very deep in my memory.
For all these childhood holidays I am really grateful.
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