Dawlish Warren

I don't have very many childhood holiday locations to remember, mainly because we didn't have many holidays back in the 1950s. But I remember Dawlish Warren - or at least I can visualise our chalet perched at the top of a slope overlooking the station. We were there in 1957, and we must have all come by train: Mum and Dad; my younger brother Wayne, still a toddler; myself, only five years old; Auntie Peg and Uncle Wilf; and their son Richard, also a toddler. 

No pictures of Dawlish Warren survive from so long ago. Dad may have brought along his box Brownie camera, but he was never one for taking still photos; which is why, once I was past the 'gorgeous blonde baby' stage, there were so very few shots of me thereafter. Dad eventually became much more interested in amateur cine photography - done on the cheap, with 'free films', although to be fair he gradually acquired a decent Canon cine camera and a proper projector, and basic cutting-and-splicing equipment for editing the footage. He captured the family that way. But he didn't really get into cine until the mid-1960s, and the fad lasted only a few years. The rest of us were never keen to be filmed. Wayne and I felt very self-conscious about starring in one of Dad's productions. I used to squirm at the results. I looked gauche and embarrassed. I still have the films and the equipment, untouched for decades now. Let them rest in peace.

I think that most of the still shots that still exist from my childhood and teens - apart from my own - were taken by Auntie Peg, who was a far more enthusiastic snapper, and certainly provided Mum with copy prints for the family album. 

So my recollection of what Dawlish Warren was like on my first acquaintance in 1957 have depended on vague personal memories from sixty-five years ago. Well, not quite: I recall driving through in 1981. I saw, as expected, a lot of new development. But essentially the place seemed unchanged. The chalets were still there, up on that rise. I couldn't see anything of the sea front - the railway was in between - and as it was late afternoon and raining I didn't stop to have a look around. So that fleeting visit in 1981 - itself forty-one years ago - didn't modify in any way the original bucket-and-spade impression. 

Fast forward to 2022. It seemed to me that a revisit, and this time a proper one, was long overdue. What would Dawlish Warren be like now? 

The Warren, incidentally, is a finger of land covered in grass and sand dunes that juts out across the mouth of the River Exe. At the eastern tip of the Warren you are not far from Exmouth on the other side of the estuary. Most of the Warren proper is given over to golf and a nature reserve. I would have liked to have taken a long walk to explore it, but my osteoarthritic knee, though improving, wasn't up to it on the day. At its western end, close to the railway, there is a promenade, and facilities for visitors more interested in standard seaside pursuits, such as amusements and rides for children, and places of adult refreshment. There is a large car park, not too expensive, surrounded by pines. Ah, I now remembered that there were pine trees at Dawlish Warren in 1957 - not these of course - just as you would expect in a sandy-soiled spot.

Having left Fiona there, I headed towards the station. Could I jog my vague memories that way? I took a cut behind that white building in the shot above, which turned out to be a café. 

Hmm. An advertisement for Brunel Carriages - old railway carriages converted into modern holiday homes with a difference. Not a new idea, of course: 'camping coaches' could be found in many places on the British Railway network at one time, usually in sidings next to a seaside station. I think the original ones were still around during the 1960s. I've no idea how good they were for a carefree holiday. Not too dissimilar to a narrow boat or a longish caravan or motorhome, I'd say. Nowadays there are many fewer of them, and the interiors are generally rebuilt to a good modern standard. I've come across them from time to time. For instance at St Germans in Cornwall in 2015 - an old carriage lately restored:  

Yes, you'd certainly get a great view of passing trains!

And again in 2019 at Rogart, in the far north of Scotland:

You wouldn't be much disturbed by passing trains at Rogart, where the standard service is four trains a day each way. St Germans would be different, with a standard hourly service each way. And at Dawlish Warren there are several trains per hour. Quite possibly the novelty of holidaying in a railway carriage, whatever the modern fittings and decor, might get a bit wearing. Even if hard of hearing, there would be the vibration. But don't let me put you off. After all, it would be very convenient indeed for an escape to Exeter's big city shops, restaurants and museums or the palm-tree delights of nearby Torbay. Or, on your doorstep, the entrancements of Dawlish Warren itself.

So to the station. A chappie was renewing the signage as I arrived.

A rather bare-bones affair, Dawlish Warren station. Not a comfortable place to hang around for a train on a windy day. The most interesting thing was that man in a raincoat on the other platform, toting a DSLR with a big zoom lens. I couldn't decide whether he was a railway buff or just there, as I was, to recapture very old memories of a childhood holiday. We must have been coeval, after all. I tried to catch his eye and get into conversation, but he didn't respond.

So, on to the resort awaiting me on the seaward side of the tracks. The sign chappie was still up on his ladder:

Just around the corner was a row of traditional beach shops, and a low, narrow tunnel to get cars and people under the railway lines to the wonderland beyond.

I was irresistibly drawn through that tunnel. What would I see? Emerging, a children's fairground on my right. 

They clearly want to impress on the kiddies that Dawlish Warren means glamourous living, Miami-style. And in fact the whole thing could have been lifted from Disneyland Florida:

The whole thing, that is, apart from references to pirates, that constant English seaside resort theme.

For the 'Fast & Furious', there was a slide:

I can't recall what lay at the bottom of this slide. Perhaps an oubliette.

For the slightly older child, there were Go-Karts, and a clue as to where parents might go when feeling peckish: 

In the distance, beyond the rather unkempt greensward, was a promenade next to the sea wall. I headed there. and studied the view.

Those holiday coaches are in the centre of the bottom shot. So they'd look out on grass, a sea wall, and a children's fairground. But they'd still have the novelty of trains passing every quarter of an hour. What's not to like?

Did any of this jog my memory? Sadly, no. Apart from maybe the tunnel. Clearly there is sand at low tide, and I must have enjoyed my time on the beach back in 1957, with my bucket and spade. But such sunny moments from a long-past summer couldn't be recaptured from these bleak views on a cold 1st April. The couple sitting on sea-defence rocks at the foot of the concrete beach-access steps are making the best of it, but the scene is uninspiring. No doubt it's much livelier in the summer, perhaps even reminiscent of Miami Beach, but I don't think I'll be back in a hurry.