IF I were half a century younger my mouth would be watering at the thought of what should be created tomorrow. Fantastic Friday is when the world s largest stick of seaside rock is due to be made. It will weigh in at nearly half a ton and be over 6ft long

IF I were half a century younger my mouth would be watering at the thought of what should be created tomorrow.

Fantastic Friday is when the world's largest stick of seaside rock is due to be made.

It will weigh in at nearly half a ton and be over 6ft long.

A teeth-rotting total of 285 kilos of sugar will go into the stick which will be rolled into shape by a team of 10 people over 24 hours.

The sugar fanatics dream has been commissioned by holiday company Butlins to celebrate the Sugababes playing at its Minehead resort next month.

When I think of rock my mind travels in a different direction - to the East Coast, and Norfolk in particular.

It is there that I have fond memories of sun-filled summer holidays.

Back in the Fifties, package holidays to Spain and other foreign climes were in their infancy.

Nearly everyone spent their breaks in this country, and the favourite destination for people from this area was the nearest coastline off to the east which, although being a minimum of 70 miles and up to around 130 miles, away still represented an exciting adventure.

The sand dunes of Hemsby with little wooden chalets dotted between them was one of our haunts when I was a kid.

A local fisherman universally known as Brownie had stalls selling delicious seafood including wonderfully tasting crabs which we delighted in cracking open and devouring. The modern Cromer crabs are not a patch on what was on offer all those years ago.

Other destinations favoured by the Adams family included Sheringham, Caister and East Runton where I remember being told off by a caravan park owner for accidentally wrapping my box kite string around his telephone wires. Anyone would have thought I had done it deliberately.

Whichever village we were staying in, the holiday usually included a trip into the busy big town of Great Yarmouth.

And it was in that place filled with bright, loud, exciting amusement arcades that one could watch as people with skills beyond one's young imagination took great lumps of what looked like molten rock and kneaded and rolled them into thin sticks of sweet delight.

And the extra magical thing about them was that in all their manipulations they had somehow managed to get the name Great Yarmouth - or Caister or Hemsby or any one of another dozen seaside resorts - running through the length of the stick. What artistry!

And one's admiration lasted the whole time it took to crunch one's way through the piece of confectionery.

What could one have for the main meal other than crab? Another public exhibition which could be viewed in those days was the packing of exquisitely smelling bloaters which in their original form of herring had been caught off the coast by the now long gone local fishing boats and landed to be transformed by being partially dried in smoke. It was lip smackingly lovely grub.

I could go on about the enormous ice cream sundaes which were a treat in the restaurant along Hemsby's main road but I have to stop now because I am beginning to dribble.