Proper Winters

[Kiop]

How can we forget proper winters when there seemed to be snow on the ground permanently from December until March?

I remember really decent temperatures where the maximum was no higher than minus 7 degrees and I used to love watching the cars struggling up the hill in deep snow and getting stranded.

Many times the school boiler would pack in and we were sent home - thought it was great.

Sledging was brillaint - I had a proper ordanary sledge but always prefer the good old bin liner to go shooting down the banking to end up in the middle of the snow-bound road.

Kids today don't seem to know what real snow and what real winters are and I feel sorry for them. I will dig out my old photos of winters gone by, scan them and post them on here at a later date in the hope that they will generate some real nostalgic memories.

Weather forcasters today seem to get their knickers in a twist when we are expected to have the grand amount of an amazing 2cms - wow, makes me laugh!

For the record, I don't wish this thread to turn into a global warming debate.

What are you memories of proper winters? Bet you have some great stories to tell?!

[Emettman]

Re: Proper Winters

What are you memories of proper winters? Bet you have some great stories to tell?!

Toughest winter I remember was 1962-63, and internet research supports this.
I was taken sledging on my local lake, and that has never supported people again.

More recently London around '80, with all traffc brought to a halt with a decent amout of snow. I hiked in five miles to work and had several cushy days as I had virtually nothing to do.
Working at Marble Arch, Hyde Park and the Serpentine were spectacular.

Where I live now snow is a rare event, though when it comes it can be in massive amounts.
We got enough over a few days this year to take decent photos, at least.

[Marine Boy]

Re: Proper Winters

What beautiful photos!

I certainly recall many more snowy winters as a child. We lived at the bottom of a hill, and like Kiop, sledging down it at speed was just brilliant. To look out of the lounge window at a heavy snowfall and then back to where the Christmas Tree stood in the corner of the room, is a picture that will stay in my mind forever.

[rossobantam]

Re: Proper Winters

growing up in the countryside, and having a half-mile driveway to our house, meant that when it snowed, we ALWAYS got cut off. My comprehensive school was a 10 mile bus journey...an old double-decker collected all us kids from the outlying scattered houses, so it had no chance of getting down the narrow lanes in winter...LOTS of school missed, even if school was actually open, we just couldn't get there!

1979/80 winter was a mean one...mum has photos of us with drifts behind us of at least 8ft in height....not just snow, but blizzard-like biting cold wind
Our pipes froze, dad went in the loft to check, and he came through the living room ceiling......cracked his rib. Spent the rest of that winter in a caravan on the drive...now THAT was cold
Two rivers within 100yds of our house..both froze THICK so we played ice hockey using old walking sticks!

No central heating back then at our house, so my bedroom walls usually had a nice thick coating of ice in the corners...getting up for school meant a mad dash to the living room fire !

[kazboot]

Re: Proper Winters

I only remember once when I was about 9 or 10 it snowed on Christmas Day. I'll never forget that magic moment of waking up and looking out of my bedroom window early while it was still dark.

We were always expected to go to school whatever the weather unless the heating packed up.
You were expected to walk to work if there were no buses because of snow if you lived within 5 miles of the office I worked at in the 80s and 90s.

I love your pics Emettman. It hardly ever snows in Cornwall, but when it does it's beautiful.

[Derekflint]

Re: Proper Winters

Toughest winter I remember was 1962-63, and internet research supports this.
I was taken sledging on my local lake, and that has never supported people again.

More recently London around '80, with all traffc brought to a halt with a decent amout of snow. I hiked in five miles to work and had several cushy days as I had virtually nothing to do.
Working at Marble Arch, Hyde Park and the Serpentine were spectacular.

Where I live now snow is a rare event, though when it comes it can be in massive amounts.
We got enough over a few days this year to take decent photos, at least.

Excellent photos - I love the sound and feel of my shoes in snow - the cold and damp I could do without, but that scrunching sound just makes me feel like I'm out in real weather, not this mealy mouthed garbage that we get for most of the year.

In terms of weather, nothing breaks my heart more than when you step outside and see slush.

[kazboot]

Re: Proper Winters

No central heating back then at our house, so my bedroom walls usually had a nice thick coating of ice in the corners...getting up for school meant a mad dash to the living room fire !

Yes we also used to have ice on the inside of our bedroom windows when I was younger.

[tulip]

Re: Proper Winters

Yup.I remember those.My birthday is in late March and I have pics of me and my friends at the living room window and its still snowing outside.There was a really bad one up here in the 90's it was minus bloody awful,diesel froze in the car.

tulip

[HG]

Re: Proper Winters

I can remember the winters of 79/80 and 81/82 being particularly cold and snowy.

Christmas 1981 was a White Christmas here (amazingly we had 2 in 3 years in the 90s though) and I remember playing on the frozen river. I can also remember having plastic sheets pinned to the inside of the windows to keep the insides from freezing up.

I still love the snow and get like a little kid when it's forecast looking out the windows and at the lampposts watching it come down. I went to Canada late last winter and it was great wading through waist deep snow, took me back to when i was young

[Richard1978]

Re: Proper Winters

I can remember nearly getting stuck in snow in one Xmas in the early 1980s, we had been to my Gran's in Melton Mowbray & on the way back we ran into really heavy snow in the Peak District & it was touch & go if we would get through.

We had similar troubles like this in 1996 doing the rounds with the relatives at the same time of year, we had to get to Northamptonshire from Melton via the M1 & A14 rather than cross country.

The worst snow I remember was in early 1987, when it snowed for most of a week & 1 day couldn't go to school because my Mum reckoned it was too dangerious to be out driving at all.

It was high enough on my estate that some people's cars were totally snowed over.

[Kiop]

Re: Proper Winters

Still working on the scans on my snow pictures, but I have many good ones to show as you can imagine with the Peak District on my doorstep.

The most recent heavy snow we had here was a freak blizzard on December 8th 1990. It was just like the winters of my childhood and everywhere looked like a scene from the Arctic with cars stranded on the road in deep drifts and the wind blowing sheets of snow up and down.

The power was off for three days and I will never forget the community spirit that emerged with neighbours who were on gas coming round with huge teapots full of stewed, tepid tea for us poor electric-only residents so we got a warm drink. My friend in town still had electricty but curiously enough his water got cut off instead so when the roads where eventually cleared we filled a brewing bin full of water for him to use and took it down to him and in return he gave us the use of his kitchen so we could cook a warm meal.

Just like others have mentioned, I too am like a big kid when the snow is forecast but it is such a big disappointment these days and there's never enough for me. Early February of this year was quite decent though, some proper snow that had been absent from these parts since the aforementioned blizzard almost 20 years ago.

I often get ice inside my car windscreen when we get a good frost and also remember it on the inside of my bedroom window when I was a kid.

For a long time it has been an 'ambition' of mine to get stranded in the car in a snowstorm on the hills and have to be rescued. Crazy I know, but I suppose I'm a bit of a crazy guy, LOL.

Will post pics soon (once my mum has dug them out) - dug them out - get it?

[Derekflint]

Re: Proper Winters

My first car was a Triumph Dolomite 1500, with the metal spoke steering wheel.

Touched it one very cold morning with my little finger - felt like someone had hit me with a hammer! And it took about ten minutes for the engine to warm up enough to even think about putting the heater on.

Went to see the Addams Family in that little beast - came out of the pictures to see everything covered in white. Unfortunately it was ice and frost, not snow.

For some reason, I actually like the thought of driving in the snow. It's the other bozos on the road that worry me.

[Gothic]

Re: Proper Winters

I can remember snow on Christmas Day a couple of times, once in the early seventies and once in the early nineties when I had to walk across fields covered with fresh snow to get to work, yes, i used to work on Christmas day!

The best snow I can remember is the Great South West Blizzard of 1978, timing was perfect as it fell on the last weekend of half-term, so we got another week of school. Have a look at this

BBC - Devon - In Pictures - The blizzards of 1978

[Kiop]

Re: Proper Winters

These are from January 1979:-







More to come when I find them.

[MommaMystique]

Re: Proper Winters

I cannot recall which year it was but we had gone over to my uncles house in Settle around about Christmas. The weather had been bitingly cold but clear skies. We were returning back over the Lancashire/Yorkshire moors and a blizzard struck. We ended up miles away from nowhere wrapped up in the blankets with our outdoor clothes over our pjs...(remember those days... coming home from visiting in your jammies so it was straight to bed when you got home.) coats etc cuddled up on the back seat with mom. I cant remember how long we were stranded for but I do know it was late the next evening when finally got home.
Another story was going up to Ingleborough... if we could see snow on Ingleborough from our house we knew it wouldnt be long before we got it in Lancaster..... and we were walking across a field and my brother disappeared down a hole which the snow had covered. Not a deep one...... stage whisper 'shame it wasnt deeper! and had to be pulled out freezing cold. Lucky for him mom was one of those ready for everything moms and had packed the picnic box with flasks of hot soup and tea.