Places We Used to Visit

Here you'll find a list of some of the places we loved to visit as kids.
Obviously they are located in and around my home area, but worth a visit if you are ever in the region.
Use the "Email My Games" link on the Wet Weekend Page to share your favourite Places.

We were really lucky to live in such a beautiful area.
I was born and brought up in Poole, Dorset, right on the south coast.
Poole has the world's second largest natural harbour, the Country's best beaches and is just a short drive from the New Forest and Dorsets wonderful countryside.
On the far side of the Harbour lies the Isle Of Purbeck, famous for it's "Jurassic Coastline.
Weymouth, Portland and Chessil beach are all a stones throw away.
I have always lived within a 10 minute drive of the sea and now wouldn't want to live anywhere else.

Bourne Bottom: Our family home is on a hill, looking down onto a shallow valley, in the bottom of which runs a small stream; the Bourne, from which the town of Bournemouth takes it's name.
The area of Poole in which we live used to be heathland and the Bourne cuts a shallow valley through from Alderney in the West, through the heath behind Wallisdown before cutting through Talbot Heath and then becoming formal gardens that run all the way to discharge into the sea under Bournemouth pier.
The area behind us in Wallisdown is known as Bourne Bottom.
Just below the heather and heath vegetation is a thin layer of sand, underpinned by thick clay.
As the stream passes through the Bottom, it forms two ponds and soaks the clay; creating a really wet and boggy playground full of year round puddles, pools and mud holes!
It was an unmanaged wilderness that was a perfect environment for a mass of wild life and a treasure trove for we children.
We spent hours in this boggy playground, exploring, paddling, hunting for newts, frogs, toads, sticklebacks, leeches etc.
Wading in the stream and back-waters, trudging through thigh high smelly mud, rolling down the hillside covered in heather, snow, rain and sun!
Our only fear being the other kids from the road below ours! No need ever to think of strangers, getting lost or being at risk!
Bumps, cuts and grazes would all be sorted out at home with a dab of "Grandad's magic stuff."
One of the ponds had an island in it, upon which I remember either Derek or Pam, my brother & sister, being stuck and my having to run home to fetch Dad to rescue them.
The Bottom in September became a bountiful giver of Blackberries and we'd come home stained purple from the juice, with plastic tubs filled to the brim.
Mum would transform these into the most mouth-watering apple & blackberry pies or crumbles!
Turbary Common: Turbary Common was over the main road and over the border just inside Bournemouth.
Another area of undeveloped heath land that had winding tracks that undulated through humps and hollows, making a perfect "scrambling" track for our first bicycles.
The great feature of this common was a large concrete area that the Parks Department had provided for the local "Model Racing Car" club. There was a Grand Prix racing circuit painted on the surface.
The course made a perfect cycle track with tight turns, fast straights etc to test our skills as cyclists and our bravery in racing one another.
Turbary also hosted a Fair once a year which wasn't the biggest ever seen, but was big enough to have dodgems, a waltzer and umbrella's!
Branksome Woods & Chine: The woods at Branksome fill a little dale that runs through a cleft in the hills to emerge on to a golden beach at Branksome chine.
This was one of our favourite beaches, famed for it's surf which seemed bigger than at any other Chine along the bay.
A cheap bus ride to Branksome left us with a half hours walk through the woods, then the formal gardens that followed the tiniest, dirty yellow stream you can imagine.
The beach was always busy in the Summer.
The good thing about this idea of having an area of gardens immediately behind the beaches at the Chines and Bournemouth is that you can come off the beach and find a quiet spot in the gardens where you can wash the sand off your feet and hands, before diving into your lunch box!
The beach at Branksome sloped gently away before rising again to form a bar just off shore.
Just a couple of miles, if that, from the harbour entrance and the main channel, Branksome had a strong under current that could be dangerous if you were unaware, but the combination of the sand bar and the current produced great waves.
The walk back through the gardens and woods seemed to last for ever! Tired out from a days playing in the sea and sun burnt too, it was good to get home again.
Once we had suitable bicycles, the trip through to the Chine became a challenge to set a World speed Record!
Flaghead Chine: Flaghead was the next Chine along toward the Harbour entrance (known as the Haven) from Branksome.
A steep pathway lead from the road down to the Chine, between a large detached house and the grounds of the local sanitorum; St. Ann's Hospital.
Where this pathway meets the prom, the beach huts begin and we were fortunate enough to have the use of the very first one for a number of years.
The huts were of concrete construction and were 2 high. Just a simple box area with a worktop down one side and no facilities, no electricity or anything.
But what a joy to have somewhere to store chairs, inflatables, foot pump and the packed lunches!
The only draw back with Flaghead was that vehicles couldn't get down to the Chine and parking was at a premium.
I remember an occasion when Father simply couldn't find a spot to park so dropped us all off at the head of the Chine pathway. I think there must have been 5 or 6 of us plus all our beach kit.
We were to walk on down to the hut while he found somewhere to park the car.
As you walk down the path, between the house and the "mental" hospital the grounds of both rise in a wooded tangle of trees and brambles etc, either side of you.
On the Hospital's side, there is a large metal spiked fence securing the property.
The path was full of families making their way to and from the beach that day, so imagine the cry's of horror as some deranged mad man could be heard tearing through the vegetation!
Grunts, thrashings and liberal swearing could be heard as the greenery shook with his passage down the hillside!
Eventually, bleeding and covered in scratches and debris, Father appeared and then realised he had to some how clamber over the fence!
I don't think we ever allowed him to park in the hospital grounds again!
Whitecliff: This is an area of reclaimed land on the shore inside the harbour, the broad bay is called Parkstone Bay.
When the mainline railway from London Waterloo was built the engineers ran the line across Parkstone Bay to the High street.
The embankment required was built on an area of reclaimed land.
On the landward side of the railway a substantial area of mud flats was drained and used to construct a new Civic Centre for Poole with Town Hall etc and to build a park, Poole Park, which I'll talk about further down the page.
On the seaward side, a strip of land we call Baiter was drained and raised to provide protection for the embankment.
Baiter stretches from the old "Whitecliff" clay cliffs at the Eastern end of Parkstone Bay, right along the water's edge, to Fisherman's Quay, the old lifeboat station and then on to the Town Quay.
This area remains a special place to play, exercise and enjoy the wonders of Poole Harbour.
There is a level walkway that runs just above the waterline for the entire length of the Bay. sadly it's now a shared pedestrian and cycle way, but if you're mad enough to get there in the Dawn, it's empty of cyclist and other dog walkers.
Whitecliff itself is now only a small symbolic cliff, much reduced from its former glory when this outcrop used to extend to the waters edge, but time, weather and the Parks department have got the better of it.
The area now has a Cricket Pavilion and wicket, a large fenced area of childrens play equipment, space for ball games and all of this faces the harbour giving a brilliant view of Brownsea Island.
But the real fun comes when the tide goes out!
At low tide Parkstone Bay empties and reveals a sludgy bottom, stranding the smaller yachts and boats moored here.
Hundreds of rock pools, little channelets and hidy holes are revealed; full of teaming life!
There's nothing more enjoyable than turning over a rock to find a crab to chase your little sister with!
It's just a fab place all year round.
There's nothing I enjoy more than a really early morning walk along the shoreline in the pouring rain!
These days, Whitecliff has another role and hosts the Helicopter Landing Area. Poole has an excellent hospital and also has one of only a few Decompression Chambers, so the Coastguard Helicopter "Juliet Bravo" is a frequent visitor.
Poole Park: Poole Park was created as a result of the coming of the railway, as I've already described.
It should be an area of which we are extremely proud and, indeed, when I was a child it was much thought of by locals and holiday makers, known to us as "Grockles".
Back then it was a favourite destination on a Sunday regardless of the weather.
There is a big boating lake that boasted all kinds of boats to hire, a Crazy Golf Course and Putting Green. A Bowling Green with it's own club house, Tennis Courts, Remote Controlled Cars and Boats, a smaller lake stocked with fish and ducks around the edge of which a ride-on Model Railway runs and there used to be a Zoo too! Unfortunately the Park seemed to go through a period of neglect after the closure of the Zoo and now the boats have gone, the model cars & boats have closed up and the Park has become renowned for its share of drunks, tramps and "druggies!"
It's a shame to see the Park that gave us so much fun, in such a run down condition,but maybe that's just part of growing up!
In the last year or so, efforts have at last been made to re-invest in the Park. The boats are back, islands have been built in the boating lake to provide nesting sites for the wildlife and even a new restaurant has appeared.
Perhaps the good old days are on their way back?
Paddling Pools: Maybe the Parks departments in the 1960's & 1970's had more money to spend or just had a better idea of what children wanted and needed back then, than our modern Councils, but it seemed to me that every big park had a paddling pool.
Some were small, unimaginative rectangles such as the one in Pelhams Park, but others were massive exciting creations like the one in Hamworthy Park. I recall there was a good one at Redhill too that was sited alongside the best equiped playground I remember.
Hamworthy Park had a huge circular pool with steps all the way round like a Roman amphitheatre!
Leading off the pool was a channel down which you could splash that lead you across the park, past an island and eventually ran out over the narrow shingle beach into the harbour.
If only we could be as relaxed with children today and let them have such play areas again, rather than selling these off for development to balance the Councils books!

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Places We Used to Visit

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