Newcastle Ocean Baths undoubtedly feature heavily in the memories of many Novocastrians.
For some, those memories are about the relief that a swim gives from the heat of summer. For others, it’s the invigorating feeling of a freezing-cold swim in winter.
And for others, like Lambton's Phil Mahoney, the memories are about the joy of eating pluto pups from the baths’ kiosk.
On Monday, Phil posted this on social media: “Does anyone remember the famous pluto pups from the Newcastle Ocean Baths shop back in the good old days?”
He posted it on the We Grew Up in Newcastle Facebook page, attracting about 500 likes and 200 comments. Phil was stoked with this.
As a young kid in the 1950s, he loved getting pluto pup “treats”.
He was the youngest of eight kids. The family would arrive at the baths on the bus from Lambton for a penny each way.
“After a day in the baths, we were treated to the best pluto pups ever made for the cost of around threepence,” he said.
“In the ‘70s, Peter Walmsley and his wife arrived as caretakers of the pool. They lived on site and ran the canteen.”
He said Peter was so popular that actor Vic Rooney from E Street nicknamed the ocean baths as Walmsley Water Wonderland.
“Peter and his wife Jan found a former canteen lady who knew the secret pluto pup recipe from the ‘50s,” he said.
“They gave her a job to recreate her magic because her pluto pups were exactly like the old days, not like the ones you get at most shops that were from a factory.”
Phil noted that the shop at the ocean baths now is called the Paymasters Kiosk.
“I have been told they were trying to recreate the famous thick, battered, tasty pluto pups from the ‘50s,” he said.
“They have a photo on their Facebook page of their pluto pups, which are looking like the old days.”
Topics should point out that the Paymasters Kiosk also sells healthy fresh food.
Nutritionists and food nazis would probably like to lynch us for talking about pluto pups.
But let’s remember what Phil said. When he ate the iconic Aussie pluto pups at the baths when he was a kid, they were a “treat”.
Gorillas and Monkeys
About 13,000 Hunter primary school students took part in the Newcastle Permanent annual maths competition on Wednesday.
Here’s a question from last year’s competition: At the zoo there is a certain number of gorillas, twice as many chimpanzees and three times as many monkeys as gorillas. Every day each gorilla eats 40 bananas, each chimpanzee eats 20 bananas and each monkey eats 10 bananas. The total number of bananas eaten every day is 770. How many gorillas are there at the zoo? (A) 7 (B) 9 (C) 10 (D) 11.
If you’re scratching your head like a monkey, don’t worry, you’re not the only one.
