I still vividly remember one icy day in the winter of 1947 (I had nightmares for a long time) whereas in 1963 I was living in the YMCA in Brighton. I won't say it was cold but the tap in my room dripped, the water froze in the downpipe outside so it backed up into the washhand basin where it froze before overflowing and forming stalagmites down to the floor. After CH and cross-country runs through slush I didn't even worry about the cold.michael scuffil wrote:The winter of early 47 was worse, if only because there were constant power cuts (which I can just remember).
As for 1963 at CH, it was actually quite fun. It had some very good sides -- no mid-morning PT for a start, and "activities" consisted mostly of sledging in Denne Park.
I remember that my swab and I kept my study fire going uninterruptedly for about five weeks. It was quite illegal -- we weren't supposed to light them until 4 in the afternoon. But in the evening I would cover the remains with ash, and in the morning he would come in and fan the last few embers into a fire, so the study was warm by the time I got there at 7.30 (I was an honorary house captain, so I was allowed to be late for breakfast.) While doing the fire, he also used the (illegal) electric kettle to make my early-morning tea, which he brought to me in bed. Those were the days...
One February in the late 1980's I was on a course camping high in the Brecon Beacons in February - they claimed to have measured 20 degrees of frost in the headquarters down in the valley where all the pipes were frozen. Muggins gets an attack of fever, soaks through an inner sleeping bag, a four season sleeping bag and an outer with sweat in under an hour; not a good night. Took four weeks to recover from that attack - I had left my pills down in the car!