Who remembers the summer of 1976?

[DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen]

2 weeks of weather like yesterday,over 30 degrees and 45 days with no rain.

I was 5, I remember endless playing late in the evenings, dad digging a hole and lining it with tarpaulin and filling it with water so we had a paddling pool , riding my chopper bike that my parents bought from our neighbour as he'd outgrown it and lots of ice creams 😂

I remember having to put cold tea towels on the car seats so your legs didn't stick to them.

Constant washing up bottle fights.

The ressies running dry.

Making dens over the washing lines with old sheets to get some shade.

Just about. I remember endless sunny days and one of those shitty paddling pools filled with a few inches of grassy water that my Dad used to try and sieve out with my Mum's kitchen sieve.

I remember car journeys that were like being baked alive. My Mum had an ancient Morris something or other with a plastic bench seat in the back and we would all get stuck to the seats from it being so hot. When you got out of the car, it was like your skin was being ripped off.

I remember lots of outdoor get togethers and picnics, although not BBQs - I'm not sure they were a thing back then so much. I do remember all the parents sitting around smoking. We wouldn't usually see that much because they generally didn't smoke inside but everyone sat outside that summer.

I also remember wasp traps. My Mum filling jam jars with small bits of jam and then piercing a hole in the lid.

Teenager then. We had a standpipe in the street, all quite sociable queuing with buckets. I got sunstroke on holiday. It was hot and obviously very dry but I don't remember the incessant, uncomfortable humidity we seem to get now, or perhaps I just coped with it better.

The ladybirds. A neighbour had a yellow car and it was pretty much red due to the influx at one point. If it had been anything less "cute" it would not have been so well tolerated! Then there was the Sahara sand eveywhere, anyone remember that?

Yes, my Dad was so proud of it. The seats were a slightly darker blue plastic. He picked it up, brand new from the Ford Dealership and within a week had caught fire!

No telly at all until I was 7 , we didn't have a set at all and then only BBC, I think ITV was seen as common 😂 As an adult I love telly and take great pleasure watching whatever I want !

I remember it well. I was 12 and had just finished my first year at secondary school. I think I must have spent the entire summer holidays outside, cycling or going to the park. I had a friend that I'd made in year 5 at primary school and I spent every day with her and her younger brother and sister. I can remember going to the local reservoir and walking right across the dry,cracked mud which normally would have been about 12 feet under water. So many people mention the plague of ladybirds,but I honestly don't remember this! Maybe they didn't visit north west London?!

You were lucky to have all that water. There were taps in the streets

I remember the first time I saw the word 'drought'', when I was about 9. There was a sign up next to a flower bed saying 'We regret these plants have died due to the drought'. I thought the word was 'draught' and thought 'How can a draught kill plants?'.

All what water, for the paddling pool? It was minute 😂

Tried to ring David Soul when he was in there, was just about to get through to him and my mum put the phone down!

@PeggyMitchellsCameo I feel your pain. I once persuaded Dad to drive me to sit outside the car exit from the hotel where it was rumoured DS was staying (gig tickets not an option of course) in case I could get a glimpse. After only an hour he got fed up and drove us home. I was devastated 😂

I do! Or maybe it’s just photo memories. I was 2.5 and we have pics of my mum in a great brown bikini and my dad in tiny shorts. And me and my brother running around the garden.

We didn't have a freezer so if you wanted anniversary cream, someone had to run down the road to the corner shop for a block of neapolitan. And run back faster before it melted.
On the good side, all of it it had to be eaten up.

I remember it really well. I was 12 so had many long days out and about with friends (we'd just go out on bikes or walking and not come back until tea time) or lounging in the garden.
I remember my Dad frying on egg on the car bonnet for a laugh and my Mum rolling her eyes at him, as was often the case😁
It was also the summer both my beloved paternal grandparents died within a very few days of each other and the resulting sense of trauma and grief. I always associate hot, heavy, oppressive days with that time of shock and loss.

Mmmmm Neapolitan….

Thank you @Gloschick I was trying to remember the name of the book and its author as I had read it and this thread reminded me of it.

I was 5 and what I remember the most are the ladybirds too! Our fence was covered in them.

Bergasol smells amazing! I love it but very expensive now.
We lived in the countryside a stone's throw from the beach and 3 months Summer holiday - it was the best year ever. What with it being the 70s, we kids went off to the beach every day to swim and mess about in boats unsupervised, it was fabulous.

He ended up being on a TV show in the 90’s where my friend was working as a runner.
She said nobody was interested he was sitting in hair and make up on his own.
Take That had just arrived as well - she hung her phone out the window so I could hear the crowds.
Then took her phone up to DS and I finally got to say hello!
And yes, I am aware of his reputation so it’s not ideal but I wasn’t going to tell her not to!
Silver Lady - still an absolute classic!

Hope he was nice to speak to after the long wait @PeggyMitchellsCameo . Ah... just Googled, he died last year.

I was unsuccessful in getting Dad to paint the Torino white flash on his red Cortina, you will be amazed to learn.

Went to Cornwall, it rained for 10 out of the 12 days we were there.

The radio was full of news about the heat.

A couple of years before I was born, but remember dad talking about it. He had a manual outside job, how everyone worked with no shirts until mid morning when they could stand it no more and ended up so tanned.
An annoyance was when they got home sweaty and hot the water would be turned off so no bath! Imagine that now…

I was 15 and taking my O levels. I was at boarding school and we were rationed to one bath a week and no more than 5 inches of water. The water that did come out of the bath taps was brown and had twigs in it. I finished my music O level early so left early and spent some time in the sun.

@DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen- there were standpipes in the streets. Water was very scarce.

That explains why I had no recollection of them. I was in Berkshire.

My DM followed Corrie but other than that , we were a BBC household particularly on a Saturday evening with the Generation Game.