Shingle Shock

 The inshore waters are broiling and frothing.  The longer view is masked in grey, at times little to distinguish between seas and skies, the horizon more melding than distinction.

Ash grey above, reflected in pearl grey waters with a tinge of green inshore.

The waves begin breaking more than 100m from landfall.  At any time there are five rows of surf rolling shoreward.  Windrush and rumble, air spoondrift sodden.

From Jenny's Well, where the grasses have been gathering sea foam blown from the rocks, I pick my way through the last of the low tide exposed nooks and crannies and rockpools.  On to the beach.

Before me stretches the long curve of the bay.  Those turbulent waters tumble on, reducing until it is but a final caress that crests the sands.  Once again I find myself the only beach walker absent a hound at foot; an outsider without the credentials for club membership.

As I doddle on I realise that all is not as it should be; the familiar has changed.  Usually I'll walk the wet sand, as the soft, deep piles of golden beach can become a tough trudge.

I find myself picking a way through increasingly deep shingle.  There are stretches where the beach is no more.  The sand has gone.

There have been some very high tides of late, crashing waves.  I ponder the possibility of the rushing surf bringing pebbles onwards, depositing them on the shore.  Or perhaps the receding waters have hauled the loose sand with them, exposing the hidden stones.  Maybe a bit of both.

Might have to ask a young environmental scientist or two for their thoughts on beach erosion.

I'd like to think Old Neptune may be kind enough, over time, to return our beach.

My return route takes me into the grounds of Cullen House, and on to Castle Hill.  Despite the bare canopy of the woods in winter, there is greenery I'd not noticed by the same path in the warmer months.  A carpeting of ivy, spreading to each and every tree; worn by the trunks as a winter coat, reaching for those grey skies above.

Across the viaducts, the tumbling surf below roaring from the depths.  The bay stretches out, a white coat rippling in the wind.

Then I see the beach, more brocolli brown and umber than the familiar golden.  Shingle and pebbles and stones where once there was soft, desert sand.  And strangely, after the high tides, no piled up wrack.  No weed at all.  It must be partying in the depths, with all that sand.