SUMMER HOLIDAYS

The met office issues a severe weather warning that can mean only one thing, the bad holiday weather jinx has struck the family of Page / Coleman once again.

Not that I’m complaining but it does seem to have become somewhat of a tradition that while others pack sun cream and swimming costumes for their summer hols, ours seem to require cagoules and wellies .

That’s the hazard I suppose of holidaying almost exclusively within the United Kingdom and it might seem like I’m exaggerating but we do seem to cop for that one week of the year when “phew what a scorcher “descends into torrential down pours and gale force winds.

In fact one  year on a trip to Butlins, it rained so heavily that we awoke the next day to find ducks paddling in the massive puddles that lay outside our chalet door.

So as we prepare for a weekend that bares a strange similarity to Perkin Flump under his cloud on a bad day, I’ve been reminiscing about the holiday memories of my childhood to brighten my day.

Now we may be about to spend a weekend in a luxury gold rated caravan in Romney but back when I was still in knee high socks, it was a much simpler affair.

Every summer holiday the brown and white Eccles caravan would be hitched up to my granddads wine coloured Austin maxi and he and my Nan would take my brothers and I down to Swalecliffe for a fortnight to give my mum and dad a break from parenthood .

Days were spent at the park on the campsite or learning to swim on the nearby beach, bobbing up and down on the water in our yellow and brown dinghy or raiding the camp shop for sweets.

Evenings would be dinner prepared over the little gas stove in the caravan or maybe fish and chips for a treat. Then we’d play the James Bond game where you had to shake the right numbers on the dice to spell out the nations favourite spy’s name or draw pictures with the pack of Paddington bear crayons on the back of old computer paper my grandparents( recyclers ,way before it became the thing to do ) used to bring home from G.E.C  Avionics.

And when it was time for bed a transformation of epic proportions would take place as the small dining area was turned into a bed for us kids and nanna, while granddad and anyone who could fall into a deep sleep despite his snoring set up camp beds in the awning .

In the morning you’d visit the toilet block where you’d pay 2p for a bucket of hot water and go into one of the curtained cubicles to do your ablutions.

Then it’d be back to the caravan for breakfast. Toast with butter or cereals in brightly coloured Tupperware bowls. Granddad one day makes the mistake of mixing up which bowl is the sugar and which is the salt and much hilarity ensues and makes me happy even now to think how something so simple could make so many people smile.

So despite being immersed in a world of electronic gizmo and gadgetry, I hope I have instilled at least a few lovely holiday memories into my kids that they can recall like mine.

And if that means i have to get up on the stage and gargling water to the tune of Gangnam style like I did last year then so be it. 

 

 MEDWAY MESSENGER COLUMN 25/08/14