Memories Of An Eight Year Old

A Memory of Rhyl.

This pond was known to local kids as The Newt Pond, as that's where we used to go 'newting', catching newts and putting them in jam jars and putting them back after seeing who had the biggest (newt!)...

We used to hire tricycles from the Bike Track, next to Rhyl FC and opposite the Grammar School (now Rhyl High School). I'd love to see any old images of the Bike Track as that was a really special place to me, full of happy memories..

Living 100 yards away from the Coronation Gardens (or Corruz as we called it), my entire childhood was virtually spent there, with the fantastic "Swings", where there were, among other play things, a rocking horse, a climbing frame, sand pit and the legendary Witches Hat (if you could climb to the top you got a good view of Rhyl FC on a Saturday afternoon ... happy days!).
Beyond that was the forbidden "Cut" where gangs used to congregate to try and swing across the "Cut" (a tiny, forested tribute of the River Clwyd), or to race pushbikes and watch "Scraps", local schools shows of boyhood strengths, all quite innocent but frowned upon by school Heads ... anybody known to have been to the "Scrap" was instantly reprimanded with 6 of the best ... sometimes on BOTH Hands ... something which proved to be an efficient deterrent ... until the next "Scrap".
The Botanical Gardens and the Coronation Gardens were one and the same, I've not been back for years, now living in Macclesfield with my lovely wife and childhood sweetheart, Prestatyn's Rose Queen, Lynne Hughes. Having stumbled across the excellent and thoroughly nostalgic Francis Frith website, the memories all came flooding back. I now intend to retrace my life steps via this truly magical site... A MUST for the top of everybody's Bookmarks...well done, Francis Frith.