Endless Summers

Just read the section from Marr's A History of Modern Britain dealing with the rise of the leisure camps in the 1950s. It seems that the first Butlin's was the one at Skegness. We went once, to the camp at Filey, around the time of the first James Bond film, Doctor No. I remember the posters there for it. And I remember the relentlessly jolly redcoats, who seemed to the little Brian impossibly glamorous. I wonder how those youngsters (for that's what they were, after all) did it.

I suppose I should be writing something wittily dismissive of the whole experience, but I loved it. In fact, I can't remember any summer as a kid that was less then magical, and, of course, they all went on forever. Until they ended.