A wipe-out at Polzeath beach

The rain bucketed down at around dawn this morning which woke me and I then drifted in and out of sleep as the showers came and went. By the time I got up the rain had ceased but it felt dreich under the grey clouds.  By lunchtime the clouds cleared from the west and the sun arrived to cheer everyone up.  A procession then started towards the beach and we joined it bey early afternoon.

Helena was determined to finish her latest novel and I had  a couple f crosswords on the go from the Sunday paper but made very little headway.  After a while i waked down to the edge of the sea which was starting to recede and I tried to work out where the best places might be for photographs at different times of the day.  The rains had obviously come as part of a low pressure system and although the winds weren't strong the waves were larger than usual, probably caused by stronger prevailing winds out at sea.

There were throngs of people in the sea using body boards on the breaking waves close to shore, and quite a few more surf boards further out .  I climbed up the cliff and could see the lines of the incoming waves far out to sea and wished I'd got my camera with me.

We went back to base for a cup of tea then eventually ventured back to the beach as UI wanted to try to catch the surfers on the bigger waves.  By the time we arrived it was nearly 7pm and the lower tide seemed to be lessening the height of the breaking waves.  I climbed over the rocks at the east end of the beach to get a better position and started to snap away.

The best waves however seemed to be at the far end of the beach so I was relying on the fullest extent of my zoom.  I followed a few surfers and then spotted this woman seemingly riding the waves really well.  And then she had this wipe-out.  I caught several frames and decided that this moment where she left the biard was the best blip, but I liked the whole series.  I have added the frame immediately preceding this blip as an 'Extra photo' which adds to the scene.  I am pretty sure she was ok, and i expect she turned around and tried again.

I turned for home and put my camera away in my bag and then had a wipe-out myself, falling onto the slippery rocks and scratching my hand on some mussels growing on the rocks at this intertidal zone.  I luckily came away only bruised and with a couple of minor cuts, but it did teach me a lesson, to take far more care and to get more suitable footwear for such clambering.