In the summer all over Sydney, not just in Balmain, it was time for the beach. And what a time it was. We had more beaches to pick from than any other city in the world.
Bondi was the most famous to people overseas but to us Sydneysiders we all had our favourites and we flocked to them in the thousands.
There was Coogee, Maroubra, Clovelly, Manly, Cronulla, and lots of other smaller ones in between, not forgetting the northern beaches like Whale Beach, Mona Vale and Palm Beach. The northern beaches were more for the silvertails and they were much harder to get to unless you had a car or lived in the area.
Everyone of the beaches had a surf club and it was very cool to to be in the clique with the surfer boys. I must say we could not have got on without them as they must have saved thousands of lives over many years. We Sydneysiders, who were beach goers, knew how dangerous it could be with rips, sandbars and dumpers, not to mention the shark danger.
I haven’t yet mentioned our all favourite beach. It was Bronte. Our family went to Bronte beach every Sunday. Rain, hail or shine we would meet up with four other families who lived in the Bondi area. They were all old friends from dad’s days when he lived in Paddington and worked at the laundry. We remained friends with these families all of mum and dad’s life.
There were the Brown’s - dad’s best mate, Les, his wife, Ruby (who I thought was very glamorous), and their only son Raymond. There was also the Samuel’s and the Shafer’s and all their children.We had great times.
To start with my sister, Eileen, and I would leave home loaded up with towels and the bits at 6.30am. We’d catch the tram outside of our house, get to Central Railway and then change trams to the Bronte tram. The trip took about one hour.
The reason for this early morning trek was to get our position at the beach. We always had the same “cubby houses” which were covered tables and chairs in groups of four. Eileen and I would get there before everyone else and put a towel or bag on each table. That would reserve them for our group for the day.
Mum and dad would arrive about an hour later with all the food and the younger kids, Norman and Gen. Al the other families would start to arrive about the same time. Our “possie” was up on the big hill overlooking the surf. We had great times. All of us kids learnt to swim and surf in what was, and still is, called the Bogie Hole. It is a very large rock pool at the southern end of the beach.
We all loved the water and dad would put us up on his shoulders and let us dive in the water. It was crystal clear and we could swim under water with our eyes open.
After lunch we would all join in a game of cricket, rounders or shuttle cock. The sand hills at Bronte were a big attraction for us young kids. They were up the back of the park where there were swings and slippery dips. The sandhills were great fun as they were very big, or they seemed to be to us kids. We used to play hidings in the shrubs and climb through tunnels and spy on the teenage lovers in the bush. We weren’t supposed to go up there but kids will be kids.
At three o’clock the Sunday school would start. The people from the church who ran it would ring a bell and kids would run from everywhere for the half hour service. They would tell us a story, ask us some questions, sing Jesus songs and then we would all get a little text about the story.
After all that had finished it would be all back in the water for another swim. The adults would play cards while all this was going on.
As the years went on I always swam in the big surf and was quite a good body surfer, thanks to dad’s good teaching, but I did like to hire a rubber surf board and ride the waves. It would cost one shilling for half an hour. It was a real treat and I would try and find empty bottles to cash in to raise the money.
We would arrive home about 7pm all tired and most times sunburnt. Mum would dab us all over with cold tea to take away the hurt. We were all very brown as we had a mixture of vinegar and coconut oil that we would put at the beach - this is something we would never do today.
They were great days.