Tag: Musselwick Sands

The Red Costume

Yesterday’s drizzly grey sky cleared in time for the afternoon low tide. You don’t spurn such opportunities – so, to Musselwick Sands for a swim. As I was walking back along the beach, from a large family group having great fun in the waves came one girl, who sat herself at the sea’s edge…
I don’t normally try doing fast sketches in full colour, but luckily I had the wherewithal: such a wonderful contrast, with the bay’s blues and greens so strong thanks to the air having been recently rain-washed.
She wasn’t there long, looking out to sea; you can see from the marks how I hurried. I think the cropped composition is best – although with that red catching the eye so, one might manage a painting with the figure small in a great expanse of beach.
The title works nicely in Welsh: Gwisg Goch

Conté, coloured pencil, & pencil
A4 paper

The Red Costume
The Red Costume (zoom)

Throwing back the sea!

Breaking from gardening tasks this sunny afternoon, down to Musselwick Sands for a low tide swim. A team of children were working very hard on sea defences; of course, the rising water was going to defeat them. As the waves started to seriously attack, the older siblings began piling sand even more furiously; but littlest one decided that they’d be most use scooping water up from the castle walls, and racing out into surf to indignantly fling it as far as they could. Talk about hard work!
The first image is the full scan; I thought I’d include a cropped version which has more punch…?

Various pencils, fine biro, some scratching out

Throwing back the sea!
Throwing back the sea! (Cropped)

Never the same beach twice

Having written this piece for our local newsletter, Peninsula Papers, I thought I would share it – with some minor edits.

The Greek philosopher Heraclitus said that one cannot step into the same river twice: it’s never the same river, and you won’t be the same person.  Similarly one cannot visit the same beach twice, because each tide changes things.  The late May sand levels at Musselwick (Marloes) have been very high because of offshore winds; furthermore swimmers are finding it shingly underfoot, even rocky in places.
  Lumpy Beach Syndrome has been reported here before: from a friend’s archives comes a Western Mail front page article of June 11th 1984 headed Riddle of vanishing holiday sands baffles the experts.  The photo shows Steve Marsden, then proprietor of Marloes Post Office (which was in The Square) surrounded by stones, his backdrop that unmistakeable black cliff.  The Mail had consulted Prof D Q Bowen (Aberystwyth University) about the situation – which was however different 41 years ago, for then the general Musselwick beach level was very low and there were reports of “lost sand” from locations all across Wales and England.
  Normality will probably return with a weather change; but, it’s well to be reminded that Nature is good at surprises.  While summer visitors struggle to picture No Beach Syndrome, we year-round shore explorers have witnessed on different occasions Musselwick, Albion, Marloes, and West Dale completely scoured to the bedrock – and then, sometimes only a day later, everything back as before!