My thirty years of camping,

In 1965 my camping days started when my father asked me to take on the 

day to day running of Tabor Farm camping site. (later to be called St Brelade 

Camping Park)  That was a surprise to me, he must have been completely fed 

up with the people that he had working for him in the past. I kept a couple of 

my men with me to work on the camp site and over a period of three months 

that  I took to close my gardening business down I kept the others men on to 

tidy up.

The first year that I started running the site we had more campers working in 

the island living on the site than we had holiday makers, at times only ten per 

cent staying on the site would be on holiday. I am sure that my father was 

pleased to have any number of campers, so long as he were making the camp

site pay. The first couple of years running the site proved to be a difficult time 

for me as I wanted to reduce the number of workers living on the site for the 

whole summer season. My father wanted to keep them on because it was 

good money and he kept reminding me that they were paying my wages and I 

should  remember that.

I wanted to run the site purely as a holiday camping site with just a few workers 

so as not to frighten genuine campers away because of their free for all behavior.

There was nothing wrong with their behavior but when they were coming back 

onto the camp site at all times of the day and night making as much noise as 

they could, we were not going to be able to have family campers coming to us.

It took about three or four few years building up a good reputation, we had to 

make our camp site a little different to the others. My father changed the name 

of the site to St Brelades Camping Park. At that time we were licensed for two 

hundred campers including children

. 

We were different to other camp sites, as well as campers bringing their own

tents we offered a complete camping package, all the tents were ready erected 

and fitted out with beds and bedding, cookers and all utensils, tables and chairs. 

Many of the tents were of the type used by the Boy Scouts association and the 

British army. The sleeping bags were filled with kapok and they took a great 

deal of time to dry out when they got wet. The folding chairs that we used were 

good quality and they were made of heavy canvas material on steel frames. The 

steel frames proved a bad choice. Once the chairs got wet they took a long time

to dry out and the steel frames became rusted under the folds in the canvas.

Unknown to us, when we took the chairs out of winter storage the following year, 

we found that the canvas touching the steel frames had perished, the steel had 

rusted right through the canvas. We had a stock of about three hundred of those

chairs including spares. Every one of them had rusted so during the following 

winter amongst hundred of other jobs, I stripped the frames down and painted 

them with a special paint and replaced the rivets with bolts as the rivets had 

fractured because that they were not up to the job. I had canvas seats made so 

that they could be replaced when required.

In the late sixties my father saw that the camping park was going to be a good 

business investment and  because of stiff competition from in and outside of 

Jersey he decided to invest in a large outdoor swimming pool, it was eighty feet 

long and thirty feet wide and four feet six inches deep. It held eighty thousand 

gallons of water. The pool was topped by water from our bore hole that we 

had had drilled a few years before. The pool was built by a company called

Marshman and I think it cost around £3,500. In the planning stages my father 

noticed that the concrete on the bottom of the pool was going to be only six 

inches thick, he requested that they made the bottom double that, they included

that at the same price. 

The work for Marshmans was made difficult because of the soil conditions. 

The pool was built in the bottom of a shallow valley. They started excavating 

the site with a drag crane from the top of the site until they could reach no 

further. They then brought in a small bulldozer called a Drott weighing about

five tons to push the soil over towards the drag crane. The lower they went 

so the wetter it became in the site. The had found the tops of three strong 

springs. At the same time they found that they would be digging into sticky 

yellow and blue clay, making the work even harder to do. Every time that 

they would dig into the clay with the digger the labours would have to pull 

the clay out of the bucket by hand to unload it. On one occasion when the

men had finished for the day, they left the Drott in the bottom of the site

instead of lifting it out each evening as they had done in the past. The next 

morning they found that the Drott had sunk down into the clay about three 

feet deep covering its tracks, its like the driver said "his seat was still dry"

When the shell of the pool was finished and all the plumbing pipes and 

pumps were connected and six feet wide of concrete slabs had been laid 

around the pool, it was my turn to complete the work by first laying sixteen 

ten ton loads of ready-mix concrete over a large area, around the pool and 

on walkways from two inches thick with steel reinforcing mesh. I had a lot

of help for that job  I then laid six hundred concrete slabs with a labour  

supplying me with dry sand and cement mix to lay the slabs on.

Growing quickly

The pool and hiring-out tents and camping equipment and accommodating 

fewer people that were working in the island made us very competitive in 

Jersey and elsewhere. We advertised the camping park in many magazines 

and national news papers, because the more we advertised the more 

campers arrived. 

Dedication, or was I a fool?

In the late sixties and the early seventies most camp sites in Europe only 

opened during the summer season, we were to be different, my father 

insisted that we would open all year round. I bitterly remember the days 

in the winter when I would have a call from my father after I had finished 

work for the day telling me to meet campers who had just arrived in the 

island up at the entrance to the camping park and help them to erect their 

tents. That was fine in good weather, but when the weather was damp, 

cold and sometimes raining and on some occasions freezing, I was still 

expected to do as he asked. Without shelter, I would have to wait 

sometimes for up to two hours for the campers to arrive late at night and 

there were times when they not arrive at all.

I did all the maintenance around the camping park during the winter 

months. I added more facilities such as toilets, wash basins and showers. 

The facilities that we offered to our camping guests far exceeded their 

expectations in quantity and quality. We applied and received a license

to extend our numbers to five hundred campers.

Early seventies 

The early seventies were the best years Jersey had ever had regarding 

tourism, hotels and guest houses were full, camping sites were struggling 

to make themselves pay. In 1972 The tourism office had twenty-eight 

thousand registered beds for holiday makers, not counting camping sites.

(in 2004 there are only fourteen thousand beds registered and that 

includes hotel rooms, many of them taken up by the finance industry and 

now includes camp sites).

No support from the tourism department.

The farming and growing industry in Jersey was struggling to stay alive.

Many farmers turned to the tourism department for help. Some wanted to 

convert some of their outbuildings into self catering but they were turned 

down. I, for one in camping wanted the tourism department to advertise 

camping sites along with hotels and guesthouses as do France and Spain, 

our biggest competitors, to be told several times during the thirty years  

when I was managing our camping park, that "Camping in Jersey is not 

the right image to advertise along with hotels and guesthouses "

During the summer season, May to the end of September, hotels were 

full most of the time, whereas camping sites were only full for the week 

either side of Battle of Flowers day, the last Thursday in July. After the 

Battle, camp sites were lucky to have their sites twenty per cent 

occupied during the month of August and some like ourselves because 

we could have taken larger numbers, were only ten per cent full.

We had been advertising in magazines and newspapers for a number of 

years and without that we would not have had many campers arriving.

We, as all the other campsites, wanted help from Jersey tourism, we 

wanted them to treat us fairly, we wanted them to do some advertising

as they did with hotels and guesthouses. But we always had the same 

excuse.

Because of the large number of campers we were registered for with 

tourism, we were charged a high registration fee. I could not ever 

understand how they could take so much from us and give so little in 

return. In our last trading season in 1994 , we were charged more than 

£2,000.00 for the registration fee. I asked again what was it for and I 

was told that it was for advertising.

Confirmation - they did not want campers!

Making an exhibition  - of ourselves.

I set up this exhibition at Empire Hall Olympia in London in 1972 to publicize our 

camping park in Jersey where we handed out, over one hundred thousand brochures

to the camping public in eleven days. The brochures were from ourselves, of course, 

and we were pleased to hand them out on behalf of travel companies such as British 

Railways and BEA and The Jersey Tourism Office.

I remember getting to the show hall and being shown to my stand the day before the

show, to set it up. Our stand was right opposite the escalator on the first floor. That 

was to be a big advantage as our biggest competition was from Spain, France and 

the UK and they were at the back of us. Well I could not believe my eyes when I 

saw that except for the timber work had been finished, all the paint work still had to 

be done. I went along to the organizes office and asked them to send a painter 

around to my stand immediately as I had a lot of preparation before the end of the 

day. A painter arrived within a couple of minutes and started apologizing for not 

starting on my stand as his painting company had not brought enough step ladders 

for all the men to use. I asked him to make a start on the lower half of the stand and

I would see if I could find him something to stand on to reach to top half. To speed

 things up a bit I suggested that I could help him to paint the top half as I was about 

a foot taller than he was. He nearly had a fit, he said I would not be able to paint 

and that unless he did as he was told by the painters union, they would all go on 

strike at the show. We compromised, after he had painted the lower half and still 

could not find a step ladder, I cupped my hands in front of my body and I told 

him to jump up, like a jockey getting on a horse. I supported him all the way around

the stand. Ten minutes later it was all finished, he had done a fine job. He did 

suggest that I might like to give him a hand, or two on all the other stands that he 

had to paint. In waiting for the paint to dry, I started unfurling the posters that I 

was going to display on the walls to find that because of the heat on the cabin 

floor in the aircraft when I went over to London had caused the paint to dry 

really hard and make the rolls almost impossible to open. They were like springs,

I had to take them outside to weather them. The weather was wet and cold, but 

it happened to do the trick Going back indoors, I was pleased to find that the 

posters had softened up and I was able to straighten them out.  

My painter friend had told the staff in the organizes office about the support that I

had given him when he was painting and they came along to my stand and started 

apologizing again, I said that it was no longer a problem. They said that if I wanted 

any help, just give them a call. I laughed,  I said I might take them up on that.

The following day, Harold Wilson turned up to open the exhibition. We were all 

ready to receive the public, a little nervous as it was the first time I had ever done 

anything like exhibition work before. Things were very quite until the afternoon, 

when we saw more people coming up the escalator and then we were quite busy.

I asked the staff on the other stands if it was going to be like this every day and 

they said the it was the same as that in previous years. Quite depressing, the 

camping public were coming into the show and spending a couple of hours down 

on the ground floor before coming up to us. After all the hard work and the huge

expense of getting to the show and all the helpers standing around with little to do,

I started thinking about doing something about getting the public upstairs to visit 

us before they went around the ground floor. I remember the staff in the office 

had said that they would give me help if I need it, well I came up with an idea, we

could offer a couple of prizes in a competition. 

The prizes 

First prize was for a family of two adults and two children to come over to our 

camping park with all expenses paid. They would have all the travel paid, from 

their homes to the camping park and return. all meals and all camping.  They 

would have a hire car for the duration and spending money. Second prize was

for the same for two adults.

I went along to the organizers office full of confidence and being prepared to be 

turned down with my idea of the competition because of it being short notice.

They gave it a bit of thought and said, fine go ahead we will give you all the help

that we can. They kept their word, they announced the competition every twenty

minutes over the public address system for the next ten days and they gave 

instructions to the elderly gentlemen selling the show catalogs at the entrance to 

the show, to call out that St Brelades Camping Park in Jersey was giving away 

a free holiday and that the public could get more information by going up the 

escalator to the first floor and go along to our stand.

The organizers also agreed to give me permission to past posters advertising 

our competition on the whole of the frontage of the Empire Hall, Olympia 

absolutely free. Regretfully I was not able to have posters made up in time, 

the five printers that I went along to around London told me that they had too 

much work on and that I would have to wait at least three weeks.

The result was like a damp squib, nobody won, although the lucky numbers 

were announced in national news papers, no one came forward to claim the 

prizes.

There is a bomb....

We were getting into our stride, we were handing hundreds of broaches and 

talking to dozens of people whom were interested in coming to Jersey in their 

tents or hotels. It was a busy time for us. When on two occasions during the 

show, I was handed a message, warning us that there maybe a bomb planted 

somewhere around the show. It maybe on our stand, please look around it 

said and went on to say do not tell anyone. I did not find one on our stand 

and I did not know of any other stand that had found one. They were terrible 

times every where that you went in London you were reminded of bombs 

being planted in all sorts of places, it was frightening.. 

It was worth the effort

We had made it. We had made the national papers, and camping magazines,

we were the blue eyed boys with the President of Tourism, Senator Clarrie 

Dupre when we returned to Jersey after our trip to London. The Senator and 

the staff from Jersey's tourism's office in London came to visit us on the stand

at Olympia. That was most encouraging as it was the first time and possible 

the last time that anyone from Jersey tourism had publicly shown any interest 

in camping. I must say that the rest of the time that  Senator was in the hot seat, 

running tourism, we had his full undivided attention regarding camping. He made

sure that we, I mean all camp sites, had a fair crack of the whip and were helped

to publicize camping in Jersey. As soon as he left tourism, we felt as if we had 

the door slammed in our faces again. I believe that there are a couple of the staff

are still employed by tourism, I am sure that they remember the discussions we 

had had with them over the years.

On a pedestal

In the late seventies we were riding high, we had recommendations from many 

associations such as the AA who gave us high star rating. The Camping Club 

International de France recommended us as the only one in the British Isles.

We worked hard at camping, with or without being recognized by our tourism

office, we had made it by our selves.

We catered for a thousand campers at the height of the summer season, seven 

hundred adults and three hundred children. We had what others described as an 

extraordinary array of facilities. We had a large swimming pool, a field for football 

and volleyball, solariums and trampolines. There was an enormous building that 

housed games rooms with table tennis and pool tables, TV lounges and a Disco 

for teenagers. In an other part we had a restaurant capable of seating over a 

hundred diners. Other buildings housed the laundry with washer machines, tumble 

driers and ironing facilities and in another we had a very busy store hiring out 

camping equipment. We hired out for use only on site everything from ice packs 

and sleeping bags to tents.

We arranged

We arranged educational games for children. I had always been able to employ 

teaches or teacher students who were staying with us for the summer season, they 

were often over in Jersey looking for employment. The teaches were able to take 

about 15 or so young children ages from five to twelve for two hours, twice a 

week. The children were of every nationality, they were encouraged to talk in 

their own language to each other and often they would talk about their culture 

and their countries, so I was told. The children enjoyed their lessons, they did 

paintings and general knowledge tests, someone would always have a prize at 

the end of the lesson, the one who won the prize was always the one who had 

shown to be trying hardest. 

Disco time

Every Friday evening before family campers were due go home at the weekend 

after their holidays, we held a Disco for the junior members of the camp. It 

proved very popular. We employed the services of a professional disc jockey 

who played the latest music, but the old favorite, the dance called the conga 

always drew the most children onto the dance floor, the decking around the 

swimming pool. No sooner that dance started, there would be as many as eighty 

children in that line.

One sided favor

The busiest year that we had ever had on the camping park was in the early 

eighties when we had fourteen-hundred campers staying with us. 

It was one of those years when the island was bursting at the seams with holiday

makers. Tourists come over to the island for the Battle of Flowers floral event in 

huge numbers without booking their accommodation in advance. The tourism 

office were pulling their hair out, they were making frantic announcements on 

the media requesting short term accommodation of any type. Home owners 

around the island, some who had never taken in anyone before rallied around,

they offered their help. Camp sites were full, they were up to their license 

capacity. We were able to take up to nine hundred campers, including children 

at that time. We had made a request for a license to take more campers as we 

had added more facilities. We  had forty toilets, forty wash basins and forty 

showers and car parking for two hundred and thirty cars. The tourism office 

asked us to take more people in. I reminded them that we had reached the limit 

of our license and we would be breaking the law if we took more.

I do not think that they were worried how many people we took in, they just 

wanted to get them under cover. They asked us to take more. We took more.

We erected an extra seventy hire tents of all types, frame and ridge tents. 

Almost every hour for the whole of that week we had calls from the tourism 

office asking us about our availability. We started by offering them fully 

equipped hire tents for families with children and when we ran out of cookers, 

tables and chairs, we were still able to give them sleeping bags and mattresses.

The new un-booked arrivals were very patient, they might have had to wait as 

much as four hours to take possession of their tents. They were so pleased to 

be able to stay, some went as far as helping us to erect their tents, and the tents

of others. 

Car parking was a problem that week, I had to make a quick decision, we had 

to find extra parking space. I decided to park all the camper's cars on our 

land across the road from the camping park It released a grassed area of land 

that we had used for parking, adjacent to the park for erecting tents. Campers 

who had been coming to us for many years were not too happy about having 

to cross the road to reach their cars on the new temporary car park. As we had 

over three hundred cars parked there, I had two car park attendants on duty 

over night. The use of the temporary car park was only intended for a few 

weeks. Using our field as a car park upset the residents in the in their homes 

nearby. They wrote to the planning office to complain about the change of use 

of the land and everyone one of them signed the letter. The planning office 

could see our situation, they could see that it was only going to be short term, 

they could understand that we were trying to help tourism's problem. Thankfully 

they gave us until the end of the camping season to continue using the field for 

parking. 

Although we had sufficient facilities for coping with the extra five hundred 

campers more than our tourism permit allowed when tourism requested us to 

help them out. It was when we applied to them for us to add an extra two

hundred campers to our permit that they turned us down flat. Do not talk to 

me about favors.

Camping was not always appreciated

PRO BONO PUBLICO below, would have to give his name nowadays

The eighties were our best years for camping.

We were one of the best run, the best facilities and location. So we were told. 

We must have been good, camping magazines and journals and camping 

associations gave us high ratings. The Camping Club of France gave us the 

highest camping site star rating in the whole of the United Kingdom and the AA

gave us one of their highest ratings. We were often on the radio and in newspapers

in different parts of Europe. We had a good long article with pictures about the 

camping park in a national Dutch news paper. We, that is I was interviewed by 

a top radio presenter, Adian Stanley for Irish Radio when he asked questions 

about our camping park and Jersey. A German radio presenter did the same,

he interviewed me in English and he translated it into German for his listeners.

I was getting used to being interviewed, my first time was in the early seventies 

when I was interviewed by the presenter of BBC Woman's Hour. That last one 

went well with family campers, it caught their attention, we had a lot of inquires 

for camping after that program.

The end of a season

 I think that my father went too far with the rules

 and regulations, I was made to enforce them.

Beechams Pills

We had more publicity when Beechams Pills chose our camping part to film one

of their advertisements. I had to erect a dozen tents of all types close together to

make the camping park look busy in March. I remember the weather being 

bitterly cold when the film company turned up to film. Dr Beecham came with 

them, he liked Jersey so much that he used the opportunity to come over that 

time to watch them filming. The two actors in the film certainly earned their    

money, they had to repeat their lines time and time again to get them right. All 

they had to do was to sit at a camping table dressed in light weight summer 

clothes. The man had to cough and the woman jumped up and went into the tent 

and came out, holding aloft a tube of Beechams Pills and saying something like 

"this is what you need for your cough" I think that everyone there would have 

wanted those pills after having to wait around for three hours in such a low 

temperature. That film went all around Britain for years, that helped to put us 

on the map. 

"Don't cough over that, have a pill". (Beecham's actors)

More Publicity

We took part in the Battle of Flowers Event. Children and adults wanted to 

take part in the carnival class that year when a gentleman, I cannot remember 

his name, came into reception one day and told me that if I was interested, he 

would be willing to organize a group to take part in the event the following year.

I must admit that I had not seen  the Battle of Flowers for over thirty years and 

I did not know how to go about it. He convinced me that he could see it through 

as he had been involved in events like that on the mainland. He kept to his word,

he was self employed at home and he said that he would happily take an extra 

week off from work  to help to organize the group. He and his wife worked 

hard, they managed to find a lot of highly skilled campers to help them. There 

were choreograph teachers and seamstresses and volunteers able to do all kind 

of chores come  forward from all around the camping park to help. That was a 

big event, many of the campers asked if they could sit together to watch to the 

cavalcade, that got me thinking. We could have our own stand, we could 

advertise the camping park on it.

Some of the Royal bridesmaids

I arranged for SGB to hire out to us three articulator type trailers and erect 

seating made up of scaffolding and timber planking. It was a very solid 

construction, it was large enough to sit one hundred and thirty people. We 

did not have any  problem filling them. We had banners attached advertising 

the park along with hundreds of our helium filled balloons and it towering over 

all the other makeshift stands.

Balloons

The stand came alive when we took along eight hundred helium filled balloons 

with our adverting message printed on them. Half a dozen of the campers had 

volunteered to start filling the balloons at six am that day. They were in fits of 

laughter most of the time as every time anyone would go pass them as they 

were working on the balloons, so they would take a gulp of the gas and give 

an imitation of Donald Duck. Thankfully I had ordered twice as much gas 

that I needed as each time the campers went passed, they would also take 

a gulp of the gas. From then on everyone had the giggles for the rest of that 

day. 

Tee-shirts

The hundred tee-shirts that I had ordered earlier arrived just in time for the 

campers to ware at the Battle of Flowers event. I remember one family 

buying as many as fourteen shirts. I must have sold over two hundred of 

them on couple of days leading up to the event. They were all going to be 

seen in public, in a big way. The shirts were plain white with a message in 

bold lettering on the back. Happiness is staying at St Brelade's Camping Park

 What a day 

What a day!  Fourteen bridesmaids, two page boys and a bride and groom. 

The camping park had been buzzing for two weeks leading up to Jersey's 

event of the year. This year we were going to take on the best in the show in 

the cavalcade class. We had put a lot of money into advertising the camping 

park in the past but never as much as we had this time in one go. 

I hired the bride's dress and the young man's pageboy outfits and I had bought

thirty feet of curtain netting material seven feet wide to be made into a train for 

the bride.  I was sent off to buy fourteen tee shirts in white for the bridesmaid's 

outfits and Paris pink dye to colour them. I decided to delegate to others the 

rest of the shopping when I was asked to go and buy fourteen petticoats and 

white shoes for the youngsters. A lot of material was used on the dresses, the 

helpers who had gone shopping were not able to find certain items so they 

adapted the materials that they had. They bought three feet wide lengths of 

white satin curtain material and cut it into twelve inch wide lengths to create

cummerbunds. Ornate cotton netting was used for trimming the outfits and 

I was again sent out on a buying spree to buy fourteen wicker baskets and 

dozens of carnations and pinks for decoration. The pinks were used on the 

brides train, I spread the train out on the ground and I scatted about a dozen

of them onto the material and I asked if they could be sown in place. 

I and others then set about making hoops of flowers for the bridesmaids to 

carry along with the wicker baskets attached to them. I used about eight 

strands of wire to make the hoops and twisted them for strength. They 

were delicately decorated with pinks and carnations and gypsophila. 

Everyone on the camping park appeared to be involved in doing something 

to help during the two weeks, there was an expert for everything, whether 

it was doing makeup or rehearsing the youngsters to act as if they were 

doing the thing for real. The youngest learnt very quickly, they were keen 

to learn.  The bride and the groom were cajoled into doing their bit. I 

can remember for the two weeks leading up to the big day, the bride telling 

me that she did not like dressing up and that she preferred wearing jeans 

and that she did not really want to do it.

I saw the bride first thing in the morning of our big day with a long face, she 

did not look very happy, she did not even speak to me, I thought that she 

might be giving me a hint that she was going to walk out on us. A little later

I saw her with a hairdresser who was camping with us, doing her hair, 

another volunteer was giving her a manicure and there was another waiting 

to do her makeup. 

The groom was looking splendid in the navel officer's uniform that I had 

borrowed from a friend, he really looked the part, especially with the sword

he was wearing at his side. Whereas, the bride did not want to wear her 

bride's cloths, the groom did not want to get out of his.

All appeared to be going well with the preparations on the camp and I felt 

that I might be needed down at the arena with our campers on our stand.

Campers were streaming down towards the arena early that day to get a 

good seat so I managed to hitch a lift with one of them. I could not believe 

my eyes as we were going along the road to see that our balloons were 

everywhere. They were tied onto road signs and barriers the were even 

tied onto policemen who were controlling traffic, there even five balloons  

tied either side of the entry to the arena. When I asked the police who had 

persuaded them to take the balloons, they said that they were approached 

by a couple of gorgeous young ladies who had asked them nicely, to do 

them a favour. The girls also suggested that they might like to ware a 

Camping Park tee-shirt.

As I went into the arena and started walking along towards our stand, I was

amazed to see that it had been given the same treatment as the road signs, it 

had our yellow balloons with our logo message, tied all over it. It looked 

fantastic, it was lively and bright, it made people look at it, I was so proud. 

The campers had done a fine job, they had even tied bright colored flags 

of all nations and large silver bows on it.

When the cavalcade of exhibits started moving along the arena with bands

playing and crowds cheering, we were looking out for our own entry, our 

little band of campers, when we saw in the distance a group of people being 

loudly cheered on by the crowds, they were our people, they were getting 

some of the loudest applauds that afternoon. The group were being led our

bride and groom followed by the fourteen bridesmaids and the two handsome

pageboys. As they got closer to us, the campers on our stand got very excited 

especially when they saw that we had won our class. 

The young lady that I had seen only a few hours before wearing jeans and a 

sad face was now in the limelight, she looked beautiful in her wedding dress 

with her beautiful coiffeured hair, she was smiling and waving to the crowds 

and thoroughly enjoying herself as did the groom. The bridesmaids were the 

star attraction, they performed their duties like professionals considering the 

short time that had been learning and their young ages. The youngest being 

five years and the eldest twelve. They had to leave holding the brides train one 

by one to present a carnation button hole from the baskets they were carrying 

and curtsy to elderly ladies in the crowds bordering the arena. They did that for 

nearly two hours, the crowds loved it.

Our entry in the Battle of Flowers was called Andrew and Fergie, it was 

topical of the time,  it was popular with the crowds as the Royals had only 

recently married.

Neighbours complained

One night after the pubs closed there was a terrible noise of youths shouting

and fighting each other coming from the entrance of the camping park. 

Thinking that they were from the park, I approached them at the same time 

as our local police. The police broke up the fighting and told them to move 

on, thinking that they were from the park, herded them onto our land. 

I did not recognize any of them, knowing that we did not take in any single 

young people at that time, we were only taking families and mixed couples. 

The police told me that they were from the camping park because the 

neighbours had telephoned them and told them so. It just happened that the 

twenty or thirty of them started auguring and fighting outside of our entrance, 

on their way to St Helier. The neighbours complaining that time was nothing 

new, they complained every  year about noise coming from the main road, 

they always suspected that the noise had been coming from our campers.  

Big bang ..... quite a coincidence

Sports day

That sports day was a day that anyone who attended could never forget.

The climbing equipment and the equipment that was going to be used in the 

swimming pool had been made ready the day before. It was a full day event 

with many campers taking part. The whole event was organized by the same 

fellow and his family that had organized our Battle of Flowers entry the 

previous year.

Big secret ..... nobody told me 

I had been approached a week before by the officer in charge of a group 

from the parachute regiment who were staying Jersey. The officer and his 

family were staying with us. He told me that a couple of his men had had 

nasty accidents one being fatal when they had been practicing dropping with 

their parachutes. He went on to explain that his men needed to have their 

minds taken off the recent incidences and would I mine if they were to help 

out on our sports day. How could I refuse help like that. I explained that if 

his men could be on site between eight and nine the morning of the sports 

day, they would be shown what to do.

They arrived

They arrived alright, dead on eight hundred hours, they came with their 

own transport, Land Rovers and trailers and one towing a gun. Once on 

site they started assembling their armoury onto their vehicles, they fitted 

machine guns and other bits and pieces with the help of the campers children.

The children, the campers and myself just could not believe what we were 

seeing, it was like a good dream, the regiment officer had kept this invasion 

a good secret, even from me.

Howitzer start

The sports events started with the tiny tots sack race dead on nine o'clock. 

That was an event the children, the campers and the neighbours will 

never forget, that race was started by firing the big Howitzer cannon that 

they had towed up with them. Unfortunately the cannon had been taken

up near the main road and pointing towards the neighbours houses was 

fired and all the packing inside of the blank shell, it was like confetti, flew 

right over their houses and onto their gardens. Not one of the neighbours 

complained about the noise as they had the night before when the police 

were called. Come to think about it now, I cant remember them ever 

complaining about noise from the camping park after that.

An advertisement I made up earlier