Revisting Youth

Sometimes the best thing to do when you’re stressed and feeling a bit meh with life is to take a step back in time. So that’s what I did J

I was lucky enough to have a little break from the city and go back to the Land of My Fathers! Don’t get me wrong, I love London. I love the pace of it, the people, and that there is always something to do. Sometimes though I need a break. From those exact things!

I decided for my hols to head home because I hadn’t seen family and friends for a long time, but also, I don’t visit different areas of Wales as often as I used to growing up as a child. When we were young, my sisters and I, we would always be taken out at the weekends to go for a run in the car. We would travel hours and hours, stopping here and there, and going for dinner, and then driving home. It was really an amazing thing that our parents did for us growing up.

The drive we used to take was all along the south west coast. We would drive through Carmarthen and all along Pendine, Saundersfoot, and Amroth. In the summer we would just drive to Pendine and spend a glorious day on the beach. I wanted to do this again. As an adult.

 I spoke to my boyfriend and told him of the little day out I wanted to do and he thought it would be nice, as he hadn’t really visited much of that part of Wales. It’s so strange, you can live somewhere all your life and never really see it all before you leave and set out on a new adventure. I haven’t been anywhere at all in North Wales, and only recently I’d even been to mid Wales.

Why didn’t I visit somewhere I’d never seen before then? Well I was feeling a bit nostalgic really. I wanted to take a journey back to a time that things were simpler, and check in with my memories from my youth.  

Spinning down the windy roads of the coast I couldn’t believe it had been so long since I’d been back down to a place I spent so much of my childhood. It was so breathtakingly beautiful, dropping down the hills to see the sea stretching out for miles. Listening to a play list of the best of the 80’s I sat in my little passenger sit prattling on about the various memories that were coming back to me. I pointed out different spots along the way that held a special place in my heart and told various stories of the different things we got up to as children.

We jumped out the car at Laughan and walked around on a little tour seeing all the places that Dylan Thomas had lived, worked, and written. We saw all the inspiration for his poems and stories, and stood in the same places as he’d stood. I love stuff like that. Being in a place so soaked with history. I recommend it to anyone to go and have a look; you get so caught up in the literature of it all.

We stopped in Pendine, and some things had changed.  I told Rob how the majority of the caravan park was just parking before. Where the caravans sat now was where my Dad would park the car when it was winter. My Mum and he would sit with cups of tea reading newspapers and books while we were sent out into wind and sometimes rain to get “fresh air”. A little trick to tire us out I now realise as an adult.

There was a small shop that sat at the cliffs edge which had closed and made way for a posh looking café. It made me sad. Kids would no longer queue up bare footed to get ice cream, and slush puppy.  Little things like that had changed, but the smell, and the feeling it gave me to be there were all the same as I remembered. I looked out to the sea, and could see us all playing in there. I could see my Mum and Dad doing their French tanning along the tide. I looked around and I’d never been more thankful for my childhood, or remembered how lucky we were to have had parents who kept us entertained and outdoors.

Travelling up through the coast we stopped at different places and each stop filled me with such a feeling of care free bliss. I had forgotten all the stresses of life. It was as if I’d taken on my childhood sense of freedom. We even climbed some cliffs like I did as a child and just sat and watched the sea. I honestly can’t believe it took me so long to go back, and I don’t understand why I don’t do it more. Why everyone doesn’t do it more. We’re so eager to get abroad and get to the sun that we don’t appreciate what’s on our doorstep. I’m sure you can say the same for Scotland and I guess even England. Jokes! England is a beautiful country which I’m ashamed to say I’ve seen more of than my home country.

It was the nicest day, and having someone to bore with all my stories was great! I’d recommend it to everyone to do a childhood adventure. It brings back memories that pictures just can’t, and it made me appreciate my parents more, remembering the lengths they’d go to to entertain us. Or put us to sleep!

We did the typical thing of having chips down by the sea, and of course some lovely candyfloss, again just like a child! In Saundersfoot we watched the fishermen bring in their catch for the day, and just as we were about to head back we decided all that walking deserved a pint, so we added on Tenby for good measure. I might have veered from my childhood course slightly but it wouldn’t’ be Welsh to refuse a pint at the end of a hard day!