It rained so I got to thinking, it's something I find passes the time away. What changes this site has seen over the years, the level area made an aerodrome, thats the old fashioned word, easy to construct.
The part of the site we camp on now was the accomodation area for the airmen and women who fought the Battle of Britain. Young men and women in their teens dressed in coarse cloth uniform and made to learn trades needed only in time of war.
I heard of an Waac and an Aircraftsman who had met here in those years and are this year celebrating 55 years of wedded bliss.
They laid drains and needed water, not for them the waterpoint at the roadside but mains water laid on in ablutions blocks and cookhouses. So a tower camouflaged amongst the tall pines was erected to supply the camp the height of the tower making the pressure at the taps.
The tower is still there, I remember it over 40 years ago when we camped here with my little horrors. So began a love affair with the site, one which was consumated each year on at least two occasions. In those times the Forest was open to camping provided you obtained a permit.
A gentleman in Brockenhurst nudged my memory by giving me a leaflet. The front page offers treats unknown today.
Tents were a shilling a night, for five nights you got two free.
If you owned a car it was an extra bob, which covered the price for a caravan too. 10/- a week was more than a third of a National Servicemans pay. In 1956 the date of the leaflet an engineer was paid £4 pounds 19 shillings and six pence a week.
Petrol was 5 gallons for a pound prior to the Suez emergency and the MOT was a thing for the future.
Seasonal permits were 50 shillings a year, entitling you to camp Friday to Tuesday. The fees covered up to six persons in the tent or caravan. This year the fee at Roundhill was £629 for 28 weeks.
Kids at camp cost 2 pennies a week if they were from a school but Scouts and Working Lads Clubs were free. This recognised the fact that camping takes discipline and if you teach children well they make responsible adults.
My power supply is topped up by a generator, I keep Jenny dry by using an old waterproof coat over a chair. But in the days of yore Tilley lamps fuelled by paraffin were state of the art. Todays run on unleaded petrol and give a brilliant light.
In those days my family had a dog a yellow labrador. Goldie was our name for 'Princess Golden Dawn Of Tiefi' she was so well bred that if she could have talked we would have been beneath her. She acted as 'Nana' to our children and was loved by everyone she met.
We used the tap beneath the water tower. "Run it until it runs clear" was the injunction from the chap who sold the permits in Lyndhurst car park. He was a Yorkshire man who chewed on an unlit pipe. He would take imaginary puffs and ask how things were in his native town. I don't know how he knew I was a Yorkie too. ;-)
The gauges on the tank show the level of water, it frequently runs low in this sunbathed spot but has never run completely dry in my experience. The rule of " By Hook or Crook" enabled the gathering of wood from the forest, it had to be encircled by your thumb and forefinger to be taken for campfires, a simple hearth well tended and with no T/V or radio a social neccessity.
But we were not the first to use this place there is a Bronze age 'pudding barrow' which tells of yesterdays inhabitants it sits encircled by a posted fence but scars from cycles show around its head.
The youngsters of today learn forest skills as they visit here with their parents each weekend. The bog is a favourite place to find newts and bugs with adult eyes keeping them safe from harm.
The Airmen had a back gate to the camp, it led to a picturesque bridge over a small beck which feeds the Lymington River. A shortcut to the village two miles away. The ground is returning to nature now and as I walked my trusty hound I sank into the boggy ground.
Some people arrived at the bridge with dry feet and laughed at the humans muddy shoes and trousers. I chased him home and dried out with a cup of Bovril ;-)
Illustration of Allen@Large is at http://www.outlane.com/page218.htm
Oh it's stopped raining now.
Allen
