My first holiday without mom and dad.

[parkwoodgirl]

Keighley Feast Week 1948 - I thought this week would never come! Sweet sixteen and off to Butlins at Filey with three of my friends. We gathered outside the Milk Bar waiting for the coach to pick us up for the long journey. Butlins had been commandered for the navy during the war, and the chalets left a lot to be desired, but that didn't worry us. Looking back over seventy years ago it certainly was basic! but we didn't let a little thing like iron beds with army blankets worry us this was our first taste of freedom. Ivy Benson and her Girls were the resident dance band and we jived away the night without a care in the world. On the second day I decidedd to go to the pool- I had received a lovely red and white two piece swim suit from my American pen-pal and I couldn't wait to pose on the pool edge and show off my glamorous swimwear. As I sat in what I thought was a Betty Grable pose a young man came and sat down next to me. We started talking, he said he was from Birmingham and I told him I was from Keighley, I was a bit annoyed because he had never heard of the place! After chatting for a while he asked me if I smoked. Well of course, I wasn't going to spoil the 'city girl'; image so I said 'yes of course I smoked. After several attempts to light it myself, he lit it for me, I hadn't a clue how to smoke, so he said take a deep breath - My head spun my eyes streamed and I fell face first into the pool!Gone was the glamorous Betty Grable, my hair which had been especially permed and with blonde tips was like a coconut mat! He pulled me out of the pool and we both started laughing. We met up every night just to go dancing, we were sixteen - post-war kids letting our hair down. Great days.

[barcroftlad]

Thankyou for this Gladys. I now have a new picture of you in my mind! Haha! You were lucky though to go to Butlin's for your first holiday without your parents. I was only 9 at the end of war and had to wait another 5 years before I got away without my folks. Then it was a weeks hard drill, a general seamanship course with the Sea Cadets on board HMS Duke of York, the battleship moored in the bay at Portsmouth. What a great experience that was. The food was terrible though! Two years later I did a similar but different holiday at Whale Island, Portsmouth, real name HMS Excellent, on a Gunnery and Radar course. Memories eh? Cheers.

[fsharpminor]

My first holiday without parents would be a KBGS one to Barcelona and Majorca in 1961 (I was 14). Couldn't get up to any mischief with Mr Frank Trenouth (Benn Trenn!) and Mr Jackson keeping a beady eye. We travelled all the way across France by train, and after a few days in Barca, flew to Palma on an old DC3 (second time I had flown, first time was a pleasure flight off Cleethorpes beach). Return to Barca was by overnight ferry, then the train all the way back again. still have some photos of this trip , some are on www.kbgs.com photo section