When I was a lad we always had a two week holiday with our caravan. It was a small caravan that we pulled behind our car. My
Mum, Dad, Gran and me would tour the seaside resorts of England, Scotland and Wales every summer. My favourite resort was always
Blackpool, 2nd choice would be
Great Yarmouth and my other fave was Skegness. Family lore has it that I went missing during a holiday to
Skegness when I was 7 years old. We’d been to the local fun park that morning where there was a great little steel roller coaster (
like this one but not this one). I was fascinated by roller coasters even then so after a couple of rides on it with my Dad my rapture just multiplied. An hour or two at the fun park had not been enough for me and I was incensed at having to leave in order to ‘go round the market’ shopping. I sulked all the way there and then secretly slipped away and made my way back to the sea front and the fun park. I found a bench to sit on opposite the roller coaster and stayed there for over 3 hours just watching it go round and round. Really, I was that easily pleased. All hell broke loose when my family found me and my legs stung for days after my Dad had finished with them. How I wasn’t whisked away by a murderous
pervert is a miracle (though it probably helped being an ugly urchin from a pit village). Anyway, from then on I was never hurried out of a fun park again (though I did go missing once again that same year and was found by a policeman in the tram depot at Blackpool, another good hiding from my Dad ensued).
I haven’t been to Skegness since I was about 12 years old and next month me and Darren are going back to ride
this (and look, there are some caravans too).
The 'Skegness' link above contains a photo of the beach and in the background is the offending roller coaster from this story. can't wait to see it again.
N.B. (for our foreign readers) a 'good hiding' is getting the shit kicked out of you by your Dad. Not really, but you know what I mean.