Why ?
Why did campers keep on coming back year after year when everybody agrees that the wheather usually stinks, the food is bad, the tents are old and leaking, you suffer from bad throat and the beds are a laugh........
When interviewed about this all campers answer that its because of the people, because of the atmosphere.
Just last week a Swedish camper I met 20-something years ago wrote: "I am so glad the camp spirit is stil alive!"
When thinking of camp that peculiar smell of the old tents floats back to my nostrils and I just love it!
I know will be back!!!!!!!
Personal Memories
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I have a million memories of that rainy, damp, muddy and occasionally sunny island tacked on to the East Coast of England. Too many to recount them all here but… how about arriving and heading up the drive flanked by all those flags, the scramble for foam mattresses and beds, duty day, the oh so familiar smell of the inside of the tents, sharing a drink and a smoke on the beach. Heady stuff indeed. I used to love the first day, settling into your village, looking around for old friends and starting to make new ones. Checking out the other guitar players. Camp concerts were one of my favourite things, I remember singing with Edda, and on my own (1-2-3 what are we fighting for?) apologies to Country Joe! Dees Talma playing classical guitar, especially that piece by Villa Lobos - even now I have to listen to it all the way through and get all misty eyed!. The Dutch group singing that strange song the name of which I cannot remember, The Onzellos, guitars by the million and lots of laughs.
I.Y.C. Mersea got into my soul and never left. It is a distant, but constant, echo. There isn't a week goes past that I don't think about some aspect of my times there.
So, if I ever meet you again fellow camp-freak
the conversation will start again
and the years will drop away
the bottle will be passed
and we will sing again the songs of constant summer.
…oh and the bit I hated the most - that's easy: leaving.
Richard Brennan
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Transportation
Back in those days, everybody from any coutry that had something that vaguely resembled a drivers licence could transport campers in one of those old run down Essex County Council Miny Busses. No safety belts available, more campers in it than seats and often a door missing. For larger groups that were to be transported to f.e. the Rotary this was used (thanks to Robert Collins for the picture):
Due to rules and regulations Campers now only can be transported in Official County Council Vans with a driver with a special permit from the same County Council. Disease
Did you know about the Mersea virussus?
No 1: Mersea throat, hits 25% of the campers and staff within a few days and simply gives sore throat, and hoarseness. Disappears within a few days with the good care of the camp nurse.
No 2: Mersea virus, hits 50% of the campers and staff, You wont know that you've got it till september. Once its in your veins you're stuck with it for life. Gives extreme feelings of restlessness round the end of july, beginning of august, and a feeling of "missing something" the whole year round, the rest of your life...........
The caring nursing staff was always ready to cure all ailments with........TCP.
The Wall
Lots of things changed since the early days. Lots things you thought would be there for ever disappeared or changed:
Reg Harris is no longer a staff member, the iron curtain opened, The Berlin Wall came down...........
Mersea had its own wall. Between the camp grass and the narrow beach a 4 feet high concrete wall would protect us from the "raging seas".
When the tide was in you could sit on it and dream away over a seascape, when the tide was out you had a perfect view of the mud plaines. In the evening you would follow the wall to the right, get on the beach and follow that all the way to the pub in West Mersea (the two Tides). At night smacking sounds would well up over the wall, since it would also be a romantic gathering place for couples seeking some romantic "privacy".
Like the Berlin Wall, "the Mersea Wall" is gone too. It's replaced by the large new coastal defense system.
the new coastline with the tide in Due to the fact that the tectonic plate where England is on is still gradually tilting back after the hughe weight of the ice masses from the last ice age, the southern half of the British isles has to suffer from rising sea levels more than anywhere else).
Food
The kitchen was run by a hardworking volunteer kitchen staff who had the ingratefull task of preparing 3 meals a day for a couple of hundred on an ever diminishing budget.
Everybody complained about the food, but nobody ever blamed the cooks!
There wasn't a camp interviewee that has not mentioned the bad food..........
Jokes were going around like
"why do seagulls fly on their back in East Mersea?",
"Tell me why!"
"So they wont have to see the food..........."
On my visit to camp a few years back I overheard a staff member asking a collegue: "what did you have for lunch, the vegetarian or the pork "cremation".
Some things will never change.............
Specially the non-English campers always were amazed by the green peas, with the size and tenderness of marbles that were served every other day.
There were a few nice things though. Shepperds pie was real nice (I will try to find a recipe for that), and you can really learn to appreciate baked beans on toast for breakfast.
No matter how hard staff members or campers complain they would all be there ready to queu up for each meal.
The dining hall now has had a fresh lick of paint. In the rear end the windows have vaninshed and there is a wall with a movie screen. Next to the dinig haal ther is a beautyfull swimming pool.
Food is no longer prepared by volunteers, and the dishes are no longer done by campers on duty. Now a days a professional kitchen staff prepares the meals in a very well equipped modern kitchen.
One thing has not changed: It still is an ungratefull job, campers still complain....... You can never please them all......
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Shepherds Pie
Still one of the favorite foods served at camp.
Do try this at home! Here is the Recipy:
Chop and fry 1 large onion in some butter till glazed, add 500 gr of minced beef and fry till nicely crumbled. Mix 2 teasp of corn flour(corn starch) in a large cup of water and add to meat. Stir till you have a nice thick sauce. Add salt, pepper (and optionally worchester or HP sauce just for the english version) to taste.
Mash 800gr of boiled potatoes with some warm milk and a lump of butter. Spice to taste.
Grease a large oven dish. Put in the meat sauce, cover with the mashed potatoes, and bake in the over for 20 minutes at 190°Celsius, gas mark 5, 375°Fahrenheit.
Serves 4 to 5.
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