Friday's Fences at Meggies

My Friday's Fences offering: this balustrade wall.  

The house is Edwardian in age and holds many happy memories which are inextricably linked with my second offering.

Cleethorpes Seafront on a spring day can be wonderful, I happened to be there on a more typical, very cold and blustery day.  This photograph shows the promenade and the pier.  In the distance you can see 'Wonderland' and the big wheel.

The strong black metal fencing runs all the way along the promenade from 'Wonderland', up to the pier and on to the leisure centre.  It stands on a strong wall, which attempts to keep the beach in place.



When I was a child it was a real treat to be brought here, by train, for a day out on the 'sands'.  If we behaved ourselves we were allowed a very short visit to the slot machines in 'Wonderland', as we made our way back to the railway station.

A trip to Cleethorpes

click to enlarge

This is the view in the other direction - the sky was low on the day I visited, so I am sorry you can't see a great deal.  The large, low building in the distance is the Leisure Centre and swimming pool, it replaced the original outdoor, sea water bathing pool, which is still affectionately remembered by many from their childhood days.

Image by jollygreenp.co.uk  Aerial Photo (RAF) 1931

I have been fortunate to find this brilliant photograph of how the bathing pool looked, from the air, in 1931.  It was vast, greatly loved and much used.  It opened in 1928 and was finally closed in 1981.

Thanks to jollygreenp.co.uk  The Pier, 1931

It held 2 million gallons of sea water and measured 400 feet x 200 feet.

I remember being taken there as a young child, it was very cold and my hand-knitted swimming costume became very water-logged and soggy.  My friend had a nice new blue ruched one, which I eyed covetously.

This old aerial photograph (1931) shows a much longer pier than the present one.  It was built at a cost of £8,000 and spanned 1,200 feet.   There is a large difference between low and high tide limits, hence the unusual length.

A section was removed during the Second World War, to help prevent it being used for an invasion attempt.

In 1956 there was a UFO sighting over Cleethorpes.  It appeared to be a glass, spherical object which stayed in the area for an hour.  It was also picked up on the radar of nearby RAF Manby.

My son Jonathan, for whom I began this blog, was born in Cleethorpes.   This makes him a 'Meggie', the colloquial name for people born there.  Cleethorpes, particularly the old part, is often referred to as 'Meggies'.  The true reason for this isn't clear, some people think there may have been a small island called Meg's Island, others think it referred to the cost of a tram ride out there, which was a 'meggie', apparently.  Please don't ask me why!

The name Cleethorpes is derived from Clee - meaning clay and Thorpes which is an Old English/Norse word for villages.

Originally a tiny fishing village,  by the 1820's it was becoming known as a health and holiday resort.  A place known for fresh air and sea-bathing.  Very bracing, being on the east coast of England.    By 1830 it had about 480 inhabitants.  Today there are more than 30,000.

Image borrowed from: portcities.org.uk

The Greenwich meridian line runs through Cleethorpes, markers indicate that the distance to:
North Pole is 2,517 miles 
South Pole is 9,919 miles
New York is 3,481 miles
London is 143 miles  


Cleethorpes is the place where my children grew up.   Jonathan was five or six when we went back there to live,  Timothy was nine, and Davina was ten.  We ended up staying there for sixteen years; the longest time I have ever spent in one place.

We have made countless sandcastles, taken donkey rides, bought cockles and whelks from the vendors and eaten pink fluffy candyfloss while playing on the beach, and possibly ate the odd ice-cream, or three!  We also know where to buy the best fish and chips in town.

The dogs were walked for miles along the promenade or taken down onto the sands,  we watched the summer carnival parades and enjoyed the Bonfire Night firework displays which are held on the beach.

Our home was the Edwardian house, shown in my first photo; it was less than two minutes walk from the beach.    It was fun, but children grow up, life moves on, and so did we.

They were happy days!

I am delighted to be joining in with Jan and Jer for Friday's Fences.  

Lots more wonderful fences can be found here.