Larkswood Pool

A Memory of Chingford.

If you wanted to have your name in the Chingford guardian you would brave a visit to Larkswood pool on the first day of the season, which was usually early May. My friend Julia Bruns and myself got our names in the paper that way but boy was it cold.I remember we used to buy a hot drink from the cafe which consisted of an oxo cube in hot water, anyone else remember that drink? To think of it now makes me feel sick but then I used to make my own ‘lemonade’ drink which was Andrews liver salts in a glass of water and also had a bedtime drink of a tablespoon full of Galloways cough mixture in hot water and I didn’t even have a cough! How things have changed.
I had been coming to Larkswood pool since I was 5 when my brother and sister took me. I couldn’t swim but I used to love my older brother sitting me on the Island in the shallow end to watch the children who could. On one occasion I was sitting on the Island when a big rough boy pushed me right in.I can remember panicking and I would have drowned if the lifeguard hadn’t been so quick to save me. I wouldn’t sit on the Island again and it wasn’t until I was 11 that I actually learned how to swim. I also grew up with a fear of anything covering my mouth. Larkswood was a great place to go and spend the day.

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