Garden Hopping!

[Lee James]

Anyone remember the buzz about going garden hopping as a kid? Can't imagine getting away with it these days though! I lived in Tinsley and it was a garden hoppers dream! Happy days!

[fox20thc]

All the time... and we used to tie black cotton the old fashioned door knockers and hide round the privet ... knocking and watching the bemusement on the neighbours when there was nobody there, or any kids footsteps legging it away from the scene

[carnew]

I used to live on barrie road at southey green.There was a road round the corner that went downhill and we used to start at the top and go down through the gardens we called it the grand national....we had such a laugh,especialy when you went over a high privet with a BIG drop at the other side,lol.

 

We also played THUNDER AND LIGHTENING....knock on the door like thunder.......and run like lightening!!!!

[Halibut]

We played at garden creeping when I was a kid growing up in Nottingham. Good, clean fun.

[hillsbro]

We called it going on "cat walks" but it was the same idea - always on winter evenings when it was dark. We had regular routes, but occasionally we would wander off in search of gardens new. And carnew's reference to a "big drop" struck a chord with me, as Sheffield - to state the obvious - is hilly, and so adjacent gardens are often on different levels. I remember hopping over a "low" wall and then dropping six or seven feet into another garden, much to my surprise. Still, it could have been worse - I could have crashed through someone's cold frame...

[Fareast]

We seemed to spend half our childhood " slate-walking " as we dubbed it. Our scene was the area from about half-way down Pomona Street to Rosedale Road [ near the Tesco precinct ].

Apart from the door-knocking and rolling dust-bin lids down passages, two of our other favourites were strewing toilet paper round gardens to ' decorate ' them and swapping people's washing round.

 

My dad used to tell me when he was young [ say 1910-1914 ] his gang's favourites were burning paper up people's drainpipes---which makes a roaring sound, apparently----and posting parcels of horse manure through the post [ not the letter boxes ! ] to people they didn't like.

 

My belated apologies to any of our victims who were trying to listen to ITMA when we disturbed their lives !

[alchresearch]

In Woodhouse we called it cat creeping or hedge hopping.

 

The Badger estate was a hopper's dream - dozens, if not hundreds, of rows of 8-12 terraced houses and gardens!

[vickb]

We used to do a similar activity we called it cat crawling.

[Gingerbarf]

Hedge-hopping in Intake wasn't that great as there weren't many long runs, it would be ten or so houses then across road and carry on.

Best one was start at garages (bottom corner of cemetery) down to Hollybank across road then up round back of Lo-cost (co-op now) all way up to gennel then over and back down to garages.

going in the snow was fun, wearing my cricket gear to hide in snow.

[madowl]

All the time... and we used to tie black cotton the old fashioned door knockers and hide round the privet ... knocking and watching the bemusement on the neighbours when there was nobody there, or any kids footsteps legging it away from the scene

remember 'Knock a'door Run? same as... but without the cotton..