As a schoolboy in the late 50s/early 60s I used to commute to school around a dozen times a year via Eastleigh or Gatwick from Jersey, even for the odd long weekend.
The most memorable event at Eastleigh, which was an all grass airfield in those days, was getting stuck in the mud (literally) after a particularly wet spell on a winters evening around 1960/61. After much gunning of engines they were shut down and all male pax were invited to disembark, and having shoveled away the mud plugs in front of the wheels, the engines were started again and with a dozen or so of us pushing on the oleos we managed to get moving again. No tug or vehicle could have handled the mud themselves. We jumped on again somewhat wind-blown and off we went to Jersey. Good job the BEA Pionairs had built-in airstairs.
'Elf and safety would have had a heart attack had they existed in those days but we got the job done and got to our destination as planned.