For ’90s kids at Hogarth Primary School, the coming-of-age event was going to ‘camp’ in Year 6. My mum wouldn’t let me take her camera, but my grandpa – a keen amateur photographer – made sure he sent me off with a disposable camera, and I can definitely blame that camera and the Peak District for the path I chose.
No-one was sure where this ‘camp’ was. To the average suburban 11 year-old in the pre-internet era, however, it was about equivalent to going to the Moon (it was actually 30 miles away). There were lots of crazy rumours about things that happened out there, including one that my friends and I started about someone getting eaten by a wolf. My stories about the school being haunted and having a grandma-turned-into-a-monster under a manhole cover never caught on, though…
Anyway, there wasn’t actually any camping involved when it was finally my turn. After about an hour and a half on a rented bus that smelled of cheesy socks, we arrived at the Wheldon School Michael Hutchinson Residential Centre, a Grade-II listed building that has served as a church, school, hostel and study centre, and is now privately owned.
Some kids (including me) freaked out that night. We were all from very working-class backgrounds, so only a few of us had ever left Nottinghamshire, let alone England. Mobile phones weren’t quite a widespread thing at that point and most of our families couldn’t have afforded them anyway, so our only connection to home was a temperamental phone box down the road, which the teachers wouldn’t let us use – we had to get used to being away from home. Despite the short distance we’d travelled, we definitely felt like we were on an utterly isolated lunar base. By the time the morning came and everything was fine, however, we’d already learned one of the life skills the teachers were trying to teach us. We very quickly went from ‘dear mother, can you hear me whining?’ to ‘dear mother, can you hear me laughing?’
On our first hike on a hot and humid day, I learned how much it’s possible for a human to sweat – and fell in love with the Peak District, which is still my favourite place in the world. My mum told me not to waste my film taking photos indoors, but I thought I knew better and took some that evening anyway.
When the lights went out in the dorm, we talked about the boys we liked. I thought Amy Rose was super cool, so I embarrassed myself trying to act like her over this boy in Year 5, whom I forgot about within a few weeks of leaving school. We all thought we were very mature. We weren’t. I mean, I’d taken a photo of one of my other ‘boyfriends,’ Wes – the player character from Pokémon Colosseum – to go under my pillow for moral support.
I bought some crystals and rocks at a cave’s tourist trap. I gave a piece of dyed agate to my grandpa that sat on top of his computer until my aunt moved in and threw it out. An amethyst cluster I bought is on a bookcase in my kitchen right now. I also bought a teddy bear that’s still around in Buxton, a beautiful little spa town in the Peak District.
The teachers held a ‘talent show’ – which seemed a much bigger deal than it was – at the hostel. Some girls sang Umbrella by Rihanna and some boys talked about Nottingham Forest. I think Umbrella won. Later, the teachers let us have a bonus round, which was just me singing ‘The Nappy Song,’ a personal invention that’s best not repeated.
We’d been learning about the bubonic plague at school – some of my old schoolwork is still in a plastic box and a ‘cure for the plague’ involving onions is currently staring at me – so the 1665 outbreak was the focus when we visited Eyam. We went to the Boundary Stone, a graveyard, an old school and a museum where I was convinced I saw a ghost. It kind of creeped us all out, but I’d love to go back now.
On a hike through beautiful Dovedale, I vividly remember a classmate wearing a bright red Nottingham Forest shirt being terrified of a bull when we had to cross a field full of cows.
I played Pokémon Ruby on the drive home and I still have the Togetic that grew to Level 100 that day. It’s a Togekiss in Pokémon Home now. Fun times.
My grandpa sent the camera off to Truprint when I got back. I impatiently waited for him to drop the photos off and proudly put them in a mini photo album that I thought was long lost, but I found it a few months ago.
The photos aren’t that great. I cut my thumb off most of them when I scanned them, and although I can almost smell those indoor photos because I was there, the outdoor ones didn’t really capture the beauty of the Peak District. I never forgot how eager I was to capture that beauty, though, or how magical it seemed when the photos produced by that disposable camera were finally in my hands.
That must have been obvious to my family, because I got a crappy digital camera for my 12th birthday and took photos of everything from rainbows to my mum’s ashtray. Applying to study photography seemed natural when I left secondary school. I ended up going all the way to university. My personal statement mentioned that camera and the Peak District, because it’s true – I never could forget how much I wanted to take photos after holding that disposable camera.
Atlas and a Camera 