Port Sunlight For A RAF Kid

A Memory of Port Sunlight.

I was born in 1958. My father was in the RAF. His mother, my grandmother lived at 6 Jubilee Crescent Port Sunlight. Whenever we moved from one RAF camp to another we would stay at my Nanas for a couple of weeks, while the house we were moving to was vacant. How I loved it there. Always so much to do. Well it seemed as if there was. My sister and I would play around the memorial, the lovely gardens. I would always feel a bit envious when I could hear all the boys playing at the boys club across from the gardens. Around the back of Nanas house there was a slope with a handrail. We would play there for ages, it was near a field with a line of trees. It seemed so big at th time, but since I've returned it wasn't actually that big. At the back of Nanas, there was a big green gate, I could just climb enough to reach over to unlock it. Down the little road I don't think it was wide enough to drive down, well I don't ever remember cars there. We would play tig, chase, football down there. In the garden I was always trying to make a"Batmobile" from wooden crates. When my sister was playing with my other sisters, I would explore on my own. I'm sure the two nearby places were Bebbington and Bromborough. I would walk around there looking in shops, just taking it all in.
At one visit, I'm sure it was mid sixties I did have a few weeks at the primary school at Port Sunlight. I don't have great memories of that time.
I remember the Dell, the bowling green and the big log seat with a little tiled roof. I'm sure it was a wishing well at one point. There was also a little bridge that was so beautiful. The big art gallery looked like Buckingham Palace to us. The houses were so lovely, so different than anything else I was familiar with. I can always remember the smell of manure around the roses,it wasn't a bad smell. Also the smell of creosote from the paneled fences. Both smells that I now associate with that time.
I used to walk into Bebbington with my Nana, to get her shopping at the Co Op. She would always let who was with her choose some sweets and a comic. I remember her buying me an I spy book on cars. I would spend hours looking around finding the cars too tick off in that book.
It was such a lovely place. I feel I was so lucky having periods of my childhood in Port Sunlight.

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