Oval

10.6C and a light breeze with a thin grey cloud layer. Few blue patches.

Please have a look at 'this day last year' ... it is one of my favourites :-)

Maeve the Deerhound and I went for our walk after lunch. Since the fields had been very wet yesterday we headed straight down the road to the shore. At the shore road we turned left along the cycle path and approached the gate in the small field with the sheep from the other direction. We went through the field and over the level crossing and down to the beach. We could see 'Valhalla VI' out at sea and her dingy moored to the furthest out post in the channel.

The tide was well out and as we walked along the firm wet sand I had a good look at the state of the beach and the dunes. The tides must have been very high over the last few days and with the breeze from the East a lot of sand has been thrown up to the back of the beach and the dunes are a mess. Down towards the rocks that lie along the shoreline in a wide band their is little sand left. On the part of the beach that lies behind the opening through the rocks that forms the boat channel the seaweed is now five or six feet deep in places. The whole picture is of a rather sad and storm tossed beach and the rather grey day didn't make it look any better. Hopefully some days of better weather will see the sea washing some of the seaweed back out into the deep and levelling out the sand.

There was nobody at the Fishermen's huts. All of the huts were locked up and everything just looked abandoned. The boats are neatly lashed up in their tarpaulins and most of the gear is stored neatly but the piles of discarded gear and broken and scrap wood that have been left around really gave the place an out of season look and feel. Maeve and I wandered round slowly and took a series of B&W shots to try and portray the atmosphere.

Back down on the sand at the creel rack I noticed that 'Wee Peem' had been pulled back round to the place it has lain all summer. That someone has bothered to do it cheered me up somewhat and I stood with Maeve and looked out to sea for some minutes. Tomorrow, we thought, we shall be on the West coast and we can't leave our favourite local blip spot feeling down. So I set the camera back to colour and had another wander round and found one or two things to get pictures of. At the side of one of the piles of gear I saw an old upturned zinc tub. I broke off a stalk of long grass and laid it through the shapes on the base and made a gold and blue contrast for today's blip :-)

Later I brought the suitcases down from the loft and packed a shoulder bag full of techy things that seem to have to accompany us on holidays these days. I suspect that we shall be without wifi again this holiday, but I will back blip as soon as I can and do my best to catch up with journals !