The sound of long hot summers past.

[Borris]

Think back to your childhood and what sound truely evokes the feeling of those long hot summer days? (Can you remember it even r raining back then? No, me neither!) Was it the sound of leather on willow? Or perhaps the sound of bees gathering pollen in the hedgerows, or the sound of a warm summer breeze wispering through the bull rushes whilst the lark sings overhead? ..............No, none of that Elgarian stuff. If was probably the approaching tinny sound of "Green Sleeves" chiming from a distant corner of your housing estate. All play would stop whilst you rushed to see if your mum considered whether you'd been good enough to have an ice cream, which to be honest, was rarely! Anyway, in my case that was the 1950's and my Mum and Dad didn't often have the spare cash to splash on such trifles. Still it never stopped me or my mates from trying.

Fast forward to 2019 and my wife and I find ourselves grandparents to eight cheeky imps and the proud owner of a very versatile California Beach. With the summer holidays approaching our van will be once again be on duty as a family fun bus, beach hut, changing room, picnic facility, campervan etc and also......an Ice cream van. We have just loaded the fridge/freezer with 44 assorted ice creams for a family reunion on Sunday. And there's still space for more.





From now on until the end of the school holidays there will always be a good stock available although it will probably be more rocket lollies etc than ice creams as they seem to be rather more popular. Definitely no sprinkles! Mrs B even has a tinny "Green Sleeves" recording ready on her mobile to anounce ice cream time. In the three years that have passed since we purchased our Beach it's proved to be a very popular facility especially when it's hot. It also saves us a fortune. The looks of amazement on peoples faces when you suddenly produce ice creams from the boot is always amusing. Sometimes, if we like the look of them, we'll offer them one as well.

Here's a few less well heard chimes from those bygone days:

 

[motacyclist]

the approaching tinny sound of "Green Sleeves" chiming from a distant corner of your housing estate

Not where I lived, just a bloke banging a triangle on a bicycle with a box on the front with dry ice in it

 

[Borris]

Not where I lived, just a bloke banging a triangle on a bicycle with a box on the front with dry ice in it

Harsh. Not much taste to that dry ice!

 

[motacyclist]

Harsh. Not much taste to that dry ice!

Well there was some ice cream in there too, but usually with more ice than cream