From our longest-serving members to our youngest school groups, we always love receiving your letters and emails. Here’s a recent selection.
Dear YHA,
Seventy years ago, in September 1949, my mother and godmother set off on a cycling adventure of Cornwall. They were 17 and 18 years of age.
They stayed in YHAs which included Plymouth, Boswinger, Kennack, Lands End, Phillack, Treyarnon Bay and Otterham, before returning to Plymouth.
They caught the night train from London, where they both worked, and set off with their bikes, panniers and food including lemonade, hard boiled eggs, apples, cakes and chocolate.
Last September my husband and I tried to recreate their adventure by cycling from our home and staying in the same hostels where possible. There aren’t any night trains anymore, and sadly YHA Plymouth has closed, so we had to change the journey slightly but managed to do some of the things they did. We stayed at YHA Eden Project, YHA Boswinger, YHA Coverack, YHA Penzance, YHA Land’s End, YHA Portreath and YHA Treyarnon Bay, so managed to stay at three of the hostels they did.
We even took the same food as them, but turned the hard boiled eggs into sandwiches!
We cycled about 200 miles and walked up many of the unforgiving hills.Â
The train journey for us was difficult, as guards’ vans don’t exist anymore, but we were determined to copy their journey as much as possible.
Staying at YHAs certainly made this trip achievable as we looked forward to a good meal and great company each evening, and a hearty breakfast in the morning. Quite a difference from my mother and godmother having to do chores each evening – though we wouldn’t have minded if we did!
Juliet Harle
Dear YHA,
I am a Railway Child and travelled on trains from a young age, often to see members of my family in Leicester, Dublin and Lennoxtown in Stirlingshire. When I left home at 18, I no longer had train tickets but still loved to travel. I was a student nurse so didn’t have much money. I had already hitch-hiked round Europe with my schoolfriends Patti and Ann-Marie in the summer holidays, and stayed in youth hostels then.
From Hammersmith Hospital, near the A40, we hitch-hiked to Oxford and stayed in the youth hostel there, exploring the city. Later, we were working eight nights on and six nights off, so we went to South Wales and The Gower Peninsula and stayed in the youth hostel on the beach there. It used to be a boat rescue house. We also hitched to Stratford and Coventry to stay in youth hostels. We saw the beautiful stained-glass windows and the Shakespeare connections.
We hitch-hiked to Greece twice, and the first time, in 1967, went through Italy. We stayed in youth hostels in Munich, Venice, Milan, Florence, Rome and Naples. There was a curfew at Naples and we were locked out, so we had to climb in the window. We saw Pompeii, which was mind-blowing.
We crossed Italy to get the Corfu ferry, but we two girls were asked by two desperate and defeated boys to split up to get to the port, because they had been trying to hitch a lift for three days and drivers didn’t want to pick up boys. We felt sorry for them and agreed, and both couples arrived at the ferry within five minutes of each other.
We stayed in the youth hostel in Athens, and two in Crete. We returned to England via Yugoslavia, then I went to Plymouth to be a pupil midwife.
In 1968 a midwife friend and I returned to Athens via Yugoslavia and had a great lift from Salzburg to Thessaloniki with a German returning home in a lovely Mercedes Benz car. We slept in the car the first night, and on the beach the second. We went to Istanbul, staying in youth hostels where we could.
Later, we took our daughters to youth hostels in North Wales, including castles, and a simple one too where a bat fell down the chimney. We cycled around the Isle of Wight on our 1935 Rudge Junior Back tandem and a solo bike, finding support, comfort, safety and fun in the youth hostel there. When I turned 70 I took a trip to Australia and stayed in hostels in Perth, Alice Springs, Melbourne and Tasmania. I love to travel and meet interesting and multicultural people.
Val Fieth
