What was your favourite piece of playground equipment?

Pict Oh

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Playgrounds today are much better equipped than when i was a youngster. Our local park has all kinds of equipment that confound me but i did manage to have a go of, and fall off, the zip wire.

In my day we had the basic set up off slide, swings, see-saw, roundabout and climbing frame. But which was my favourite?

The Slide
I favoured the prone descent on the slide but you had to wear the right frictionless clothes to achieve optimum velocity and quite often fell off the end into a muddy puddle or slid through something nasty that had been left on the slide.

The Swings.
I always headed for the swings first hoping that one would still have a seat. The slow tilt beginning leading to the full weightlessness arc used to thrill me. Then the textbook dismount at the top of the arc landing nonchalantly 10 feet away from the swings just topped it off.

The See-saw
I was never a see-saw type of person. You needed the co-operation of a friend on this piece of equipment and i was always a playground loner.

The Rounabout.
I loved the circular motion of the roundabout, i never felt queasy. We used to try to make the roundabout reach terminal velocity whilst everyone tried to cling on for dear life. Usually i was the runner who pushed the roundabout.

The Climbing Frame
What was the point of this when there were plenty of trees to climb instead. I had no use for the climbing frame.

I would therefore have to plump for the swings as my favourite.

As an aside, i have vague recollections of a 'witches hat' apparatus which i think was deemed too dangerous for even 80's children.

What was your favourite piece of playground equipment and why?
 
We had American swings in my childhood playground, never seen them since - one person sat each end and you both kind of pushed it back and forth, it went really high! Also had a bell shaped climbing/roundabout things which was quite cool. All got removed on H&S grounds ages ago for bog standard swing/ide/roundabout you see everywhere now
 
Excuse me, you've forgotten the Witches Hat!!
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The Rounabout.
I loved the circular motion of the roundabout, i never felt queasy. We used to try to make the roundabout reach terminal velocity whilst everyone tried to cling on for dear life. Usually i was the runner who pushed the roundabout.

This was actually pretty dangerous wasn't it?
 
I missed it as I was looking at the bold items. Witches Hat was great fun, trying to get the outer ring to hit the centre pole when swinging on it. Can see why they banned them though.

View attachment 1489773
The more kids there were on them, the more fun it was and probably, more dangerous too. Not that adults gave a f.eck in those days. If you did fall off, they'd just say it was character building!
 
I missed it as I was looking at the bold items. Witches Hat was great fun, trying to get the outer ring to hit the centre pole when swinging on it. Can see why they banned them though.

View attachment 1489773
We never had a witches hat in any of the playgrounds where i grew up, i think it was banned by then. I feel like i missed out. However, i've heard it make be making (a safer) comeback. I will have to search one out and have a sneaky go.
 
The more kids there were on them, the more fun it was and probably, more dangerous too. Not that adults gave a f.eck in those days. If you did fall off, they'd just say it was character building!

Yeah, our local one was on a tarmac playground which made life interesting if you fell off.
 
All playgrounds were tarmac, concrete or hard baked earth in my day

There were a couple on grass in our area. Although that tended to have been worn down to the hard dirt around the various bits of equipment.
 
As an aside, i have vague recollections of a 'witches hat' apparatus which i think was deemed too dangerous for even 80's children.
We have one in a local park.
 

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