By Fred Parsons
“I loved to gather driftwood from our playground by the sea To be used for seaside cook-ups, or boil water for a cup of tea; I relive fond salt water joys, playing with family and friends. Oh, to return to our Back Beach, to feel like a child again.”
Lushes Bight, Long Island, NL, has some amazingly picturesque sites, but there’s none more impressive than Back Beach. This locale was regarded as our childhood playground. The wide variety of activities served us well as physical exercise, enjoyment, and stress reduction. The features of this beach area, located directly out back from our house on Parson’s Point, are almost too many to mention. I will, however, refer to those which continue to stand out in my memory – which continue to remind me and my family of the pleasures of literally having a seashore playground right in our backyard!
Skipping rocks was one of our most popular pastimes. Even on Sundays, when we were children, we weren’t really allowed to skip rocks. We bent the rules a little and argued with our parents that we didn’t see much ‘sin’ in that activity. We did, nevertheless, involve competition in the skipping – competing to skip a rock (very flat ones worked the best) the greatest number of times. As time passed, Mom and Dad saw that this popular activity helped to hold us together as a family and kept us out of trouble, so to speak.
Collecting a variety of beach rocks, shells, and driftwood was another enjoyable pastime. When we were growing up, my sisters spent time painting them and used these rocks for decorating flower beds and walk-ways. Shells were either painted, especially mussel and sea urchin shells, or the small ones (like periwinkles and conchs) used to create necklaces or decorative school projects. Even the carapaces of the shoal water crabs, which had collected on the beach, were also used for decorative purposes. Sometimes, various types of shells were glued to odd- shaped pieces of driftwood to create a beautiful creation for a lawn or bridge display.
Much of the larger pieces of driftwood we gathered were used for our beach boil-ups or the kitchen stove during the late spring or early fall. We would pile the short pieces of driftwood in a secure spot to create a fire for boiling lobster, crab, and mussels or cooking a pot of Fisherman’s Brewis.
I remember one of our boil-ups was more elaborate than just cooking one thing or the other, like cod or shellfish. It was a full-fledged cook-up – a Jiggs dinner with all the trimmings. Several family members attended, and we ate the meal there on the flat rock section of Back Beach. Oh, yes, we still boiled a pot of mussels for an appetizer. Everything was so delicious! Back Beach was an ideal observation site to glimpse some of nature’s thrilling and entertaining sights. We’d hide in the bushes just above the beach to view seagulls and Arctic terns feeding close by. Observing bird antics was not the only way we were entertained. Dolphins and whales also came close to the shoreline in that area. Dolphins are always a pleasure to observe in their constant porpoising through the water. Whales, on the other hand, surface only occasionally while they are searching for food.
From the beach area, we would also make our ascent to the back lookout, another higher altitude observation site, where each season offered a wide variety of attractions: Northern rough ice and icebergs with an occasional foundering; the occasional adult seal and white coat; roaring seas and breaking rocks and shoals with a variety of offshore island birds driven in by the strong northeast winds of fall; schooners from the Green Bay area returning from Belle Isle or the Labrador shore loaded with fish; local fishing trap skiffs returning from the trap fishing berths and lobster fishermen returning to the harbour with their catch of lobsters; and young seagulls and terns continuing to train their flying skills.
Another popular activity for both children and adults was daring the swelling tide. We would run
to the edge of the tide when it receded and then run back in an attempt to escape it before it washed over our sneakers. It was amazing to observe how fast this swelling tide can roll back onto the beach. Sometimes we would escape it, and other times it would flood our footwear. We enjoyed the activity, whether our feet were wet or dry at the end of each session!
Picking berries was another commonality at the beach. In particular, we picked blackberries which Mother used for both puddings and cakes. We’d make sure that a sufficient supply was taken to the house so that she could bake one of our favourite desserts topped with her delicious homemade sauce. The upper section of the beach was lined with blackberry bushes and this fruit was readily available to us. Oh, yes, we’d eat a fair share, also. In addition, there was a supply of partridgeberries along the path to the beach, but these would not be ripened until late fall. There was also a variety of out the 1950s. Fortunately, while swimming, boating, or fishing, we never encountered a serious water-related incident. The final feature I’ll allude to is lobster catching in the cove at Back Beach. There was one inlet of the cove, adjacent to the flat brown-rock section of the beach, which contained fairly deep water and the ideal bottom structure for lobster holes. Sure enough, I always set three or four traps right in that inlet with a highly successful return.
My siblings would walk out to the area to catch a glimpse of me hauling my pots. The flat rock area allowed them to look directly down at the traps before I pulled them aboard my punt. I would encourage them to do this because I knew they could get a sense of whether each pot contained a lobster or two. An obvious sign was when the lobsters’ claws extended through the slats – sometimes in an attempt to get away from others contained there! Seeing these protruding claws would alone create excitement in the minds of my onlookers! Having a lobster boil later would be even more gratifying!
It’s not difficult to conclude how much the natural environment at Back Beach meant to my family and me during our childhood and early adulthood days at Lushes Bight. It was a little piece of heaven located just a stone’s throw away from our door! When Wayne Chaulk wrote the beautiful song “Salt Water Joys,” he must have had prior experience with my section of Long Island. Without question, Back Beach provided seaside joys for all members of my family – both young and old alike!
Fred Parsons can be contacted by email at fredparsons72@gmail.com.
