It does not seem very long ago that my parents, my brothers and I lived in Claremont, spending our time after school and at the weekends catching tadpoles at Butler's Swamp or swimming at the Claremont Baths with the brown jellyfish. Yhe building of hot trolleys and cubby houses kept us out of mischief.Saturday afternoons would find us at the Claremont Movie Theatre on Bayview Terrace watching a Western and summer evenings were spent at the open air theatre, sitting on wooden benches waiting for a chance to sneak to the deckchairs.

Butler's Swamp is now the Claremont Golf Course and Bayview Terrace is no longer the friendly family shopping centre with Bovell's fine home-made pies, Miss Jacobson's pharmacy, the Claremont Hotel, the Theatre Deli and the Princess Tea-rooms.

Across the road stood the Claremont railway station with it's rickety footbridge. How we loved to run up the steps and stand on the bridge when a steam train was passing and be enveloped in smoke and soot. And what a thrill it was when the engine driver tooted his whistle at us.

The Royal Showgrounds were nearby and the billycans of milk along with the lovely country smell of the cattle, was a highlight of the year.

During the summer, there was the Speedway every Friday night. We would walk up Ashton Avenue with our blankets to protect us from mud and gravel when the riders came around Fowlhouse Corner.

Karrakatta Cemetery was another close neighbour, many a time we would go and re-distribute flowers from a grave with plenty to one without any and play hide and seek among the tombstones.

Our street had an average of five kids per family and each afternoon we would gather to play football, donkey or brandy. Cars didn't speed along the avenue as they do today.

Now, as I drive along "our" street, I see re-modelled houses with two cars in the driveway and not a child in sight.

My, how times have changed............Ros