I used to go off on my own when I was 4 in Saudi at the shopping centres.
Used to do the same at the Havant Hypermarket, I'd go to the toy aisles while my mum did the shopping, then, while looking for her I'd normally get picked up by someone and taken to customer services where they'd call mum over the tannoy
I'd also snorkle up and down the first reef (about 100m from shore) in the Red Sea on my own.
Spent 5 years doing that, disapointedly, I only saw 2 sharks, both during the last weekend I was there
Oh and up in the mountains at Taif, I'd go off rock climbing on my own.
Also at 4 I used to go to the woods behind our estate where the older kids had built a BMX track.
The woods were full of kids back then, either racing round the track, building dens or daming the stream.
It's funny, back then, the woods were always full of life and sunny.
5 years later, and the older kids had grown up and moved on, and the younger one's parents were too scared to let thier kids out of their sight.
The river no longer got damed, no dens were made, no laughter was heard in the woods, they were darker, scarier.
Such a shame.