A Walk From Shotgate Baptist Church To The Nevendon Road Part 2 See Part 1 And 2 Below

A Memory of Wickford.

Continued from Part 2

On the south side of the fire station were a few houses and then a footpath that led to the other entrance to the recreational ground. Also in this area, Laburnum Avenue, were a lot of war time prefabricated houses, which were later demolished.
A little further on, on the left hand side was an old village hall type of building, Im not sure what it was for but I remember that is was used for child clinic, as I remember going there for my various jabs when I was really small. To the side of the hall was a track that led to the brick fields. These were some fields where they had extracted the clay to manufacture bricks, obvious really! There were some of the old buildings and machinery left standing that were used for the brick making process. But best of all there were several ponds where you could catch newts, tadpoles, sticklebacks, water beetles and all sorts of aquatic creatures. Some of the dragonflies were so large and colourful.
Further along Nevendon Road on the left hand side was a row of old terraced houses, presumably Victorian. Along this section of the road there used to run an open ditch, which was later covered in for most of its length.
Walking along there was a garage on the right, next to Grange Avenue, where I lived until I got married and moved to Colchester. The Nevenden Road then went round an S bend with some shops on the left, including a post office and newsagents. A little further along was the Marks family house which had a monkey puzzle tree outside. There was then housing until Cranfield Park Road where there was then open countryside all the way to Rayleigh to the east and to the Southend Arterial Road and the outskirts of Basildon to the south. This walk ends here.

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