Solo Travels Aged 7

I recently wrote about my childhood. I touched on the solo trips I went on. Sneaking out in the early hours of the morning, getting around London on the tube and buses.

Memories from that time are fragmented and disjointed. Murky.

These are generally happy and carefree memories of discovery and adventure. Nothing bad happened to me, or nothing I perceived as bad. Obviously a 7 year old shouldn’t be going around by themselves but I covered the reasons for that in the other post.

Some memories that come to mind.

On many of the trips I was trying to get to airports. Fascinated by planes and wanted to see them up close.

One such trip I was heading to Heathrow on the now defunct A1 airport express red double-decker bus. Met a Chinese family. It was two women with two kids. We talked upstairs at the front of the bus. Can’t remember what about. Got to Heathrow and they gave me a big goodbye hug. “Where are you going?” I asked. “China.” I wanted to go with them but they wouldn’t take me. China sounded interesting.

Another trip, went to London City Airport. It was very new at the time, only open for a year. Staff approached me and asked “where are your parents?” “At home. Where are yours?” I responded. I wasn’t being sarcastic or funny.

I told them I’d come to see the planes. They took me to one. Got to sit in the cockpit with a pilot. He explained the controls. The levers, dials, buttons and lights. How the flaps worked. I was curious about everything. Then I was handed over to the police. I was getting used to that. Handed over or stopped by the police.

I spent a fair bit of time in police stations. I’d have to wait for a vehicle to be available before being driven home. In the meantime I’d be entertained and fed. Chips with brown sauce in the police canteen.

There was a wall map of London with pins stuck in it at Heathrow police station. They explained the different pins and crimes. Burglaries, assaults and murders. A police officer with a missing little finger told me about the knife fight he’d lost it in while I sat on his desk. It was the most amazing story I’d ever heard. Not sure if it was at this police station or another one.

One of the police officers, Colin, gave me a picture of a Concorde from a calendar. I kept that for a long time. It was special.

I started enjoying the attention and company of the police officers. And they seemed to enjoy telling me stories and feeding me. After a few trips I realised since I’d inevitably end up with the police anyway, I might as well just approach them if I was tired and ready to go home. “I’m lost. Here’s my address.” Paraphrasing a little.

I didn’t think of myself as a little kid. I didn’t have contact with other kids anyway. Didn’t go to school. I was a person like anyone else in the world. Just smaller than most. Quite comfortable approaching strangers. Asking for a little change if I was feeling hungry. 50p could go a long way back then.

There was the time I tried to get to the Woolwich ferry. I’d already been on it on a rare family outing. Wanted to go again. Ride it back and forth. Unfortunately there was a tube and bus strike on the day I set out. No trains at Newbury Park station. So I started walking. A few miles and got to Barking. I think. Hungry, I went into a little shop to get ice cream.

They’d run out of the vanilla, chocolate and hazelnut Cornetto. Only mint chocolate left. I reluctantly bought one. It was delicious.

Went into a pet shop next door and ate my mint Cornetto while looking at two kittens in a cage. I’d never seen kittens before. One ginger and the other black. They looked at me. I looked at them. Finished my Cornetto and left.

A mint Cornetto always reminds me of this.

Then there was the time I went to ride the new Docklands Light Railway. It was driverless and you could sit at the front and pretend to be the driver. I rode it a few times before ending up at Limehouse police station. They had someone locked up in a cell. Very loud. Maybe drunk. They’d open the little panel on the door and shout at the person to be quiet. They held me up and let me shout too. It was fun!

All these memories are a bit jumbled up in my brain. I get flashbacks sometimes. They don’t trouble me. Good memories. The reasons behind why I was out there, why there was no intervention, why the police were fine to just blithely deposit me back home without further thought, all of that gives me pause. I guess the system failed me. I’m sure there’s a lot to unpack there. Another time.

I’m glad I have these memories. I’m glad I had these adventures. I wouldn’t change a thing.

All of it happened. I just wish I could remember more.