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A fascinating place! I was ten in 1954 and I discovered that if I bunked off Sunday school I could easily enter the Old Docks on my bike. You just waited until a lorry was going in or out and went in on the opposite side to the policemen on the gate who would be talking to the driver. Miles of railway line, ships all over the place, banana van trains being steam heated by USA tank engines, tugs getting up steam, BR ferries sailing in and out, dry docks all over the place, some empty, some full of water and the odd one with a ship in. Nobody seemed to mind me wandering about, except the policemen on the gate - I was usually caught on the way out. The New Docks were somewhat more difficult to enter but I managed it a couple of times. Later I discovered that if you could get hold of a rowing boat you could go practically anywhere were there was water and a trip round the Outer Dock and the Empress Dock was quite common. Little did I know that some years later I'd be running in and out of the Outer Dock on P&Os 'Eagle' and 'Dragon'.
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