Part of a Longer Walk

.....a bend in the Linear Park Trail. Here the river widens out and becomes coastal. The water reflects the flat sky. Horses graze on the grass plain right down to the water's edge, wearing coats which are green, purple, navy and sky blue.

Under the last bridge is a seascape and boat. We're walking towards the sea.

The sun is a hazy white disc behind grey knitted clouds. The river is brown with white patches. Pacific black ducks, ibis, herons and grebes appear and disappear. If the river is heading for the sea you wouldn't know it. The wind blows its ripples back the other way.

A bicycle comes up behind us. Ding. We meet people with dogs.

It's a Dutch landscape although I've never been to Holland. I have always thought this, about here.

We cross the road to the sand hills. We look left and right. We are looking for jetties. Jetties mean kiosks and kiosks mean snacks. But the jetties are too far away.

The sand is white, littered with weed. At the edge of the sea it dips suddenly and the sea is foreshortened and deep. It looks like a theatre set, with the waves moving sideways on pulleys.

We turn south. A seaweed ball follows us, blown by the wind. I turn around quickly and it stops.

Problems with Seascapes

Sunday afternoon at Brighton. Pliny, her mum, and Nostradamus are walking along the esplanade towards the Brighton jetty. It is sunny but windy, and Pliny and her mum are feeling a little bit cold. Pliny is trying to think of an interesting way to describe the jetty.

The sun shines on the bleached wooden pylons, each space between the pylons framing a blue rectangle of sea. Between pylons 17 and 18 the rectangle frames a red and yellow surf life saving boat, further down the bay.

The following day Pliny writes that down.

You have only described what was under and beyond the jetty, observes Pliny the Elder, looking over her shoulder.

Just trying to give a different perspective. I don't like the Brighton jetty very much.

Perhaps you could make it talk, like you did the sea the day before. That was very innovative.

O thankyou, but if that jetty could talk it would only say beware.

Why?

Because it has a mobile phone tower at the end, cunningly disguised as a ship's mast and crow's-nest. But yes, I like to write about the sea. My diary is full of seascapes.

I should like to see those, said Pliny the Elder.

So should I. They aren't very easy to find amongst all my other remarks.