Romney Sands is located southwest of New Romney. The Romney Hythe and Dymchurch Railway station used to be known as Maddiesons Camp, but has been called Romney Sands for some time. I believe the holiday camp here is still going.

Memories of Romney Sands – Maddiesons Camp

Here are some memories of Romney Sands – Maddiesons Camp sent in by kind readers. Stories such as these and photographs of the area are always welcome and gratefully received!

Chris writes of his memories in the 1970s:

“I stayed at the holiday camp with my school, I shared a ‘hut’ with my pal Reza (who dreamt that one day the Shah would return out of exile to rule Iran again.) It was at the back of the site and looked out over the concrete ‘listening posts’ and the vast tracts of shingle. I’m sure one the ‘huts’ was blown down where we were there.. but that might just be a tale we made up many years ago & now can’t remember if it’s true or not.

We did get into trouble for pushing one of our teachers in the outdoor pool. Mainly because we didn’t give her a chance to take her watch off… rather than the dunking which she took in good spirit. I remember the vast food hall & the double seat bikes you could hire – we spent ages ‘driving’ round the site.. I certainly didn’t have any money, so not sure we ‘hired’ it.

Reza used to bring back strange, amphibian insects from the pools in the shingle & put them in the sink.. unfortuantly none of them seemed to live very long. I suppose coming from a freezing cold, dark, still & remote pool didn’t really build you up to be put in a sink with the hot tap running, however well intentioned it was.

Our Headmistress, being a particularly religious lady made us all go out on the sand for prayers on arrival, making us all kneel in the sand, soaking our knees. We had a day trip to Rye – to sketch the church and maybe a trip to Dover.”