Ice Cream Man & His Ice Cream Van

It doesn't matter what age you are, one of the most popular and timeless features on our streets today is the ice cream van - or ice cream truck as it's known in the USA. 

I found this out for myself just last week when I went walking with my family on a Northumberland beach. As we finished our walk, I spotted an ice cream van which had just pulled up in the nearby car park. 

Ice Cream Van Cones

A woman with two young children was being served. The kids were like statues as they stood motionless and silent, watching intently as the ice cream man prepared their creamy gelato cones and then carefully topped them off with a chocolate flake. 

In the UK this is called a 99 cone - a classic! If you're not familiar with it, there's a fascinating history behind the name 99 ice cream cone. Check it out courtesy of Quora.

Directly the children had been handed a cone each they became animated with smiles of joy and excitement and I immediately recalled the same feeling from my childhood days. Delicious! 

Whilst deciding whether or not we should treat ourselves to a delicious cone, an elderly couple presented themselves next at the ice cream van counter. Again, smiles all round when they received their ice creams. This time it wasn't ice cream cones - they had chosen an ice cream tub each, one with what looked like chocolate ice cream and the other with strawberry. That was it, we were next! What did we have? Not a cone, not a tub but a chocolate ice cream sundae!

Ice Cream Music

So why should this ice cream experience be worth writing about? Well, by sheer coincidence a friend sent me a video of their latest song - it's called 'Ice Cream Man'  !!!
 


Of course, Paul is not the only musician to write about ice cream. Here is Van Halen's famous Ice Cream Man song ....

Now back to the ice cream van I saw in Northumberland .... 

The only disappointment that day was that I didn't get to hear any actual ice cream music playing from it! That's another fun thing about ice cream vans and trucks - they all play different tunes when they are going down the street. Needless to say, the music that ice cream vans and trucks play varies from country to country. For example, in the USA the most popular ice cream truck tunes are “The Entertainer” and “Home On The Range". By contrast, in the UK it can be one of several songs such as the famous piece from the medieval music era - Greensleeves. Another UK favourite is O Sole Mio which of course Elvis Presley recorded as It's Now Or Never. Such fun!