Skatey...The life of Les Skate

Skatey
The Life of Les Skate
Well that was the end of it! I
went and told the
bloke…and he accused us of
knocking over the wall! I
said, ‘Right, we’re out of
here.’
Of course, it was holiday time and the whole place
was booked out. So, I ended up going to the Police
Station. One of them organised a room in an old guest
house for us. They were full but they made room for
us. They saw the problems we had had. Tim was in
hospital for the night. From then on it was alright and
we enjoyed Victor Harbour after all. We did a bit there
and had a good time.
Another memorable trip I had was with the boys, when Rol was in the scouts. He would
have been about ten or eleven. They had a trip away to Ayers Rock. There weren’t enough
boys from one scout group for the coach so we made it out of three groups. Myself and
another father were in charge of our lot. I knew the coach driver from the local bus
company fairly well. So that worked well and we had a good drive up there. We climbed
Ayers Rock and they all enjoyed it.
My boys weren’t too bad but there were a couple of devils in the Croydon Scouts. (We
were the West Croydon scouts.) One particular devil in the Croydon group went on to be a
leading footballer for the Essendon Football Club. But back then, oh, he was a devil! He
climbed everywhere where he shouldn’t have, and my blokes were following, and I was
trying to get them back. Oh Gawd, that was an experience. But it was good.
My boys weren’t too bad but
there were a couple of devils in
the Croydon Scouts.
In those days there were no facilities. There were
these sheds like old horse stalls, all open, with a
few showers. You put two shillings in and you had
to go like mad before the water ran out. We
catered for ourselves because we had a good cook
on board. Each night one group or the other had
to help out. That worked out alright.
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