Childhood

A Memory of Sanderstead.

I lived in Mayfield Road, which is where the foreground bollards are situated, from 1961 -1979. The junction was a little bit treacherous when cycling in the wet as I found out to my cost. Although a Girls school, boys could attend in their primary years. At weekends and on many nights the footbridge over the station was closed (there must have been wierdos then too) so when I went to church (St.Augustines) I had to walk all the way to the top of Mayfield Road and round the corner shown here to go down Sanderstead Road.
I came and had a drive through here with my family earlier this year (we live downunder now) and the roads seem a lot narrower than as a kid! I remember waiting on the footbridge in the 1960's for my father coming home from work and getting showered in soot from the steam trains going under my feet. Also I remember buses going up Sanderstead Hill with a full passenger load (403, 408, 470) and arriving at Sanderstead pond with steam billowing out from their radiators. The driver would get out and top up from a watering can kept near the bus stop. My elder brother married at the old church in the village.