I fell in love with Skipsea almost immediately. I liked the caravan, I liked the holiday park, I liked the countryside and I liked the beach and the sea. The exceptionally fine weather helped of course.
On the first day of the holiday we went to the beach. The park owners said that due to severe coastal erosion there was no direct access to the sand and the sea but someone helpfully told us that there was but it was quite dangerous and the park owners didn’t want anyone taking legal action against them for having an accident.
We found the steps and made our way to a wide sand and the sea almost two or three miles long and only a dozen people on it. It was empty, it was wonderful, it was wild, it was a millionaires private beach.
I didn’t really expect to be swimming in the English North Sea but it seems that children don’t feel the cold and have no fear so they were straight in and I was obliged to follow. Surprisingly it wasn’t too cold. The exceptionally fine weather helped of course.
Whilst we frolicked and swam in the waves I was taken back as though in a time machine to my childhood family holiday memories.
Bad weather didn’t stop us going to the beach and even if it was blowing a howling gale or there was some drizzle in the air we would be off to enjoy the sea. If the weather was really bad we would put up a windbreak and huddle together inside it to try and keep warm. Most of the time it was necessary to keep a woolly jumper on and in extreme cases a hat as well and Wellington boots were quite normal. As soon as the temperature reached about five degrees centigrade or just slightly below we would be stripped off and sent for a dip in the wickedly cold North Sea in a sort of endurance test that I believe is even considered too tough to be included as part of Royal Marine Commando basic training.
After the paddle in the sea we would cover ourselves up in a towel and making sure we didn’t reveal our private parts struggled to remove the sopping wet bathing costume and get back to our more sensible woolly jumpers. Then we would have a picnic consisting of cheese and sand sandwiches and stewed tea from a thermos flask – no fizzy drinks or coca-cola in those days.
If the sun did ever come out we used to get really badly burnt because when I was a boy sunscreen was for softies and we would regularly compete to see how much damage we could do to our bodies by turning them a vivid scarlet and then waiting for the moment that we would start to shed the damaged skin off. After a day or two completely unprotected on the beach it was a challenge to see just how big a patch of barbequed epidermis could be removed from the shoulders in one piece and the competition between us children was to remove a complete layer of skin in one massive peel, a bit like stripping wallpaper, which would leave us looking like the victim of a nuclear accident.
Beach holidays in the fifties and sixties were gloriously simple. The whole family would spend hours playing beach cricket on the hard sand, investigating rock pools and collecting crabs and small fish in little nets and keeping them for the day in little gaily coloured metal buckets before returning them to the sea at the end of the day.
There were proper metal spades as well with wooden handles that were much better for digging holes and making sand castles than the plastic substitutes that replaced them a few years later. Inflatable beach balls and rubber rings, plastic windmills on sticks and kites that were no more than a piece of cloth (later plastic), two sticks and a length of string that took abnormal amounts of patience to get into the air and then the aeronautical skills of the Wright brothers to keep them up there for any decent length of time.
I remember beach shops before they were replaced by amusement arcades with loads of cheap junk and beach games, cricket sets, lilos, buckets and spades, rubber balls and saucy seaside postcards. I can remember dad and his friend Stan looking through them and laughing and as I got older and more aware trying to appear disinterested but sneaking a look for myself when I thought no one was watching. I knew they were rude but I didn’t really know why.
What a glorious day this was and with the weather forecast predicting more of the same I knew that I would be doing the same thing all over again the next day.
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Again, I like the no (or very few and dispersed) people aspect. Looks like a very nice beach.
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Because it was difficult to reach it was practically deserted.
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We’re should make everywhere difficult to reach.
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And …… the sand lingered in between toes (and private parts) for hours. No yobs on beaches either in those days or they’d have been “sorted”!
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Sigh, the sand, so difficult to remove from the carpets in the car.
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Sounds about right, Andrew. I have very similar memories 😆
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Lovely beach and getting bigger every year!
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Me too, Jo!
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A wonderful description of a 50s seaside holiday, but you missed out the Kitkats. A foot long they were, not like today’s measly efforts!
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And the Mars Bars and the Milky Way!
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A good beach day and some fabulous memories too!
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Perfect……but what happened to the caravan vow?!!
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I relented on that two or years ago. I am happy to report that they are much better now!
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Brilliant piece. Do you go back to greet the other fossils washed out of the muddy cliffs and scattered around on the beach?
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We found some fossils amongst the clay and the sand!
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You lost me at caravan…..
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A caravan is a holiday home, mostly static but sometimes towed, rather like a camper van!
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Hey ho…the days of I Spy
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I remember it well. I wonder if children today would find it so interesting. My grandchildren came to visit last week and they all have I-phones and tablets. Sad really!
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Childhood seems to have disappeared
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Being South African I definitely don’t understand a beach holiday by the North Sea.. Way too cold for me.. 😉
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It was heat wave week, up to 35 degrees c!
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You’re brave! I have no idea how I survived days at the seaside as a kid. We used to go to Bridlington or Scarborough in the main, with the odd occasional diversion to Filey. However, the sea regardless of resort was always bloody freezing in my recollection. Also, given the sun block thing, it’s a wonder I still have any skin!
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To be honest Stella the sea wasn’t that cold but than again 50 years on I have got a lot more body fat insulating my vital organs!
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Great post!!! Brought back lots of memories of east coast holidays as children – although we went along the Norfolk coast, jolly bracing sometimes but always lovely – and as kids we didn’t care if it was a bit rainy! Wonderful to relive it now with grandchildren – I know my cousins have great days away to the seaside. Of course we live by the sea here just a mile south of Weston-super-Mare, the sea might be warmer, but I wouldn’t fancy it!!
I’ve never been to Skipsea but I shall put it on my list!
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The sea temperature was quite comfortable after crossing the swimming trunks line!
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Haha! I like that, the swimming trunks line!
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Always a difficult moment when entering the North Sea!
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This may be an indelicate question, but as a child did you eve have knitted trunks? My husband did – and I remember other boys wearing them – weren’t they ghastly!!!
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I certainly did Lois, I think I am wearing them in that picture in the post!
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Haha!! I thought so! we had woollen swimming costumes too but we could keep them in place by tying the straps at the back with a ribbon – then struggling to undo it behind your head when it was soaking wet, salty and sandy… Kids today, they have it so easy with their lycra!
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I’m surprised your private parts had not risen out of sight
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It took some time to relocate them Derrick!
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🙂
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I enjoyed reading about your childhood beach holidays. I’d love to go on a 50’s or early 60’s British beach holiday.
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I did my best to recreate it for my grandchildren even down to no internet access in the caravan.
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As one gets older it is reassuring that children will always have fun at the seaside. Great photos Andrew.
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I tried to recreate a 1950s family holiday even down to no internet access in the caravan.
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We lived by the North Sea so had many days on the beach just as you describe. Proper spades are indeed the best for sandcastle building! The only memory I can add is being slathered in calamine lotion at night when I was so badly burned I could hardly move my arms enough to get my clothes off.
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Calamine Lotion dabbed on with cotton wool, whatever happened to Calamine Lotion. These days I use SudoCrem!
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I hated the smell! And it dried solid.
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Brilliant post, Andrew!
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Thanks Clare, I appreciate that!
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Our grandparents lived near the beach in Central California, Andrew, and we spent many happy hours playing in the Pacific. The waters off the coast of California are similar to the waters of the North Sea… icy cold. But the weather was better. My grandfather loved to fish in the ocean so he preferred more remote beaches that were rarely crowded. As for sunburns, we could manage those just fine at home in the Sierra foothills. Our challenge was to see how brown we could be by the end of summer, however. And being California, we had a bit more sun than you did. Like every day. 🙂 –Curt
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Barbecued epidermis! Cheese and sand sandwiches!! “endurance test that I believe is even considered too tough to be included as part of Royal Marine Commando basic training.” Oh man, I love it when you are in this kind of mood when you write.
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Beach holidays in England in the 1950s were a real experience let me tell you!
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I’m sorry I can’t go enjoy one of those right now.
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Pingback: Yorkshire, Skipsea Beach — Have Bag, Will Travel – Rexton digital
Beautiful photos.
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Thanks for stopping by.
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