All At Sea

It is hard to imagine how big a seagull is until they try to take food from you. It’s at times like this that you forget all attempts at bravery, and throw the measly flake of cod that is in your hand and flee to a safe place to eat in peace. This happened to me in Eastbourne, where I guess the seagulls usually outrun their victims. Pigeons are much easier to deal with. They will creep up on you hoping for the smallest crumb of anything including cigarette butts but will scarper when spotted.

Seagulls are an important part of the seaside experience for me as much as eating fish and chips out of the paper. Or trying to win enough two pence pieces to fill all your pockets and still have to carry some of them home in bags or those little plastic cups the put out for you. These are the same coins that anywhere else would be dropped on the street, put on charity buckets or put in jars and forgotten about. The temptation to win that plastic watch or key-chain becomes too intense but as soon as you lose your last penny you shrug it off and move on.

The seagull that scavenges along the coast and, more and more inland, is the Herring Gull. They can weigh as much as three pounds. Their wingspans can be frightening so they are the last thing you want to see when picnicking on the seafront is the silhouette of a hungry gull bearing down on your mini scotch eggs. Their distinctive plumage and their natural squawk make them vital to any visit on the coast. I think it’s the way that they make flying seem so easy, the way they just glide in the air. They are an immediate reminder of where you are and add to the atmosphere.  This is amidst claims that their number have been in rapid decline some have to resort to stealing bags of Doritos from shops.

I used to live not too far from the coast, but I never felt the draw of the beach. Most of my class at school would go down to Hayling Island when the sun was out and frolic along the sands and make friendships that last. I didn’t have many friends and so I was happy to go down to the creak with my dad every so often and look for driftwood. I saw a dead seagull on one of these trips. I had seen animals squashed to the road before but this was different, the feathers that hadn’t dropped off hung to the skeleton with bits of flesh that hadn’t finished decomposing or been picked off by other seagulls. It was over the bow of an old boat that was in a similar state of disrepair. We changed route after that so my sister couldn’t see. She wondered what the fuss was about. It wasn’t that exciting.

 Now that I live inland I long to return to the coast, I don’t mean the sun kissed beaches of Europe where the beautiful and drunken Brit mix in imperfect harmony. Nor do I mean that capital of tackiness, Blackpool. These clichés of beach life don’t appeal to me. I don’t begrudge anyone who enjoys this type of holiday, everybody needs their own ways to escape from whatever it is they do for the rest of the year.

I have made excursions to the Lincolnshire coast; not very often and most likely I will never return. I wasn’t impressed by my first visit to Skegness, known for its ability to be ‘bracing.’ Like all drives as a youngster it seemed to take forever, and then there wasn’t a great deal to do there if you didn’t visit Butlins. The next visit when I was old enough to drink alcohol made it a little more bearable but in other ways that had its own limitations; all my friends wanted to do was get drunk and have conversations on the rides about their top 5 cartoon characters while the forces of science tried their best to dissuade them. What they talked about that they couldn’t have done while being thrown in different directions I will only be able to speculate on. I was firmly on the ground holding onto coats and bags. At night if you look out to sea you can see lights off shore. One of my friends commented he thought that they were the ‘sea police.’ In reality they are likely to be oil rigs or if more recent trends suggest offshore wind farms.

Cleethorpes is peaceful and tidy but unremarkable in many ways; of its features is a natural pond just off the promenade but not an uncommon feature. I have only been a couple of times and for a large amount of that time I had my back to the sea. There are apparently a number of Lincolnshire cricket fans who want to see a professional standard of the sport and every so often Nottinghamshire indulge this and where better than by the seaside? This was the reason for both visits so I may not get to know the place better. Cleethorpes proximity to Grimsby is probably what puts many people off; with its tradition as a fishing port placing it in the same league as Hull in terms of appeal. Thinking about it Hull probably has an unfair rap as well. I only saw the train and bus stations so am in no position to comment.

I was on my way to Scarborough. The train takes a route that passes along the coast for much of its journey. Once you pass Beverly you start the journey towards the Yorkshire coast. People head for Bridlington where the train empties and refills before its onward journey to Scarborough where the line ends, and you’re a short walk from the beach. My hotel there was on the wrong side of the town for the tourist areas. So I didn’t see the Scarborough that everyone thinks of, but I did get the time to visit Anne Brontë. Her grave is not far from the ruins of the castle. I like to think it was the inspiration for the little castles you find in goldfish bowls. I took the long way round, walking up the hill requiring a sit down half way up, as opposed to walking further down the road, which would have meant not struggling with the steep climb.

The grave itself is inconspicuous. Most of the people who were looking for it walk straight past. I feel she got a better deal than her sisters because where they died was far bleaker. The Yorkshire moors for me are depressing, as is most of West Yorkshire; there is something about the colour of the moors. It’s the dark browns of the heath and the way the sun never seems to generate any warmth and when added the harsh industrial buildings of the early 1800s you want to get out of there sharpish. The village they lived in has now become a place of homage to many but the Howarth they knew was a place that life didn’t prosper, the water was polluted and so was the air. The towns and cities nearby such as Wakefield blend the grand Victorian gothic with the town planning of the 1960s and 70s to create places that when you visit you want to leave.

For many years most of my family’s holidays were taken on the Isle of Wight. We would camp in a farmer’s field and it would just be the four of us; my parents, my sister and me. While we didn’t make friends with other kids we got plenty of space to run around. The size of the island meant that we were always close to the sea. One of my favourite days out was to Blackgang Chine. I’m not even sure what was there. I do remember the dinosaurs; there are photos of me and my sister posing next to them. Apparently during the hurricane of 1987 they broke free from their stands and made a swim for it, before being washed back ashore. It seems that the dinosaur will never meet a dignified end.

One of the local bus companies used to advertise a day out in Ryde. You could get the bus to Portsmouth and catch the catamaran over to the Island. This was all in a reasonable priced combined ticket. The biggest disappointment other than using the offer only once was the predictable advertising slogan, “Ticket to Ryde.”

It only takes twenty minutes on the catamaran, fifteen minutes on the hovercraft and a lot longer on the ferry. The beach seems go on for ever, when the tide is out you feel you can walk back to Portsmouth. Because the beach reaches so far out the catamaran docks at a pier that requires a train to get to the esplanade. Once there you can wonder around the town which is as many people like to point out is stuck in a time warp. This is part of the charm of the Isle of Wight; it has survived bombing raids during the Second World War and rock festivals in the 60s and 70s. But it has kept its integrity, in many ways that is commendable. Many of the holiday destinations abroad are desperately trying to keep up with the tourist. Huge hotels spring up in places that used to have some beauty or charm that attracted people there in the first place. We explored most of the island and we only stopped going after my mum was bitten on the leg by a dog. Most of the last day of that holiday was spent in a doctor’s surgery while she updated her tetanus shot. When we moved we started going to Hayling Island for holidays instead.

My dad never liked to pay the prices charged by most attractions so we used to do everything that was free so we only ever got to the gates of Carisbrooke Castle, and for a long time that was the same with Porchester Castle although you could walk around the grounds for free there. I eventually went on school trips to Porchester. The castle was enclosed inside some of the most complete Roman walls in the country. The Keep was Medieval and said to be a favourite of Richard II but I still hate the steps that lead up to the roof. The narrow staircase that spiralled up only had a bit of rope to hold onto, I would imagine that when first in use there wasn’t even this precaution and especially no fire exits. I always thought that some Norman soldier would come in the opposite direction and send me tumbling.  The view of Portsmouth and the surrounding area made it worth it in the end and thinking about the famous people who had stood here before me. Henry V stayed there just before going to France to claim another throne that wasn’t rightfully his.

One day we took a small wooden boat that my dad had built and launched it out to sea tied to a piece of string and would bring it back in when the novelty wore off. One day however, the string snapped and the boat sailed out to sea. It looked to pick up speed and rolling over the waves it looked like it was enjoying itself, just like the model glider we took out into the New Forest and saw fly into the distance, climbing on each new thermal. I like to think it’s still up there flying somewhere over South America on its fourth or fifth circuit. It felt like this was going to be the same with the boat. It would have been somewhere in the Pacific now if another kid hadn’t swam out and rescued it. I didn’t mind paddling out into the shallows, but Porchester didn’t have a beach and I wasn’t prepared for a swim.

Emsworth is another place where we would go as a family. There was an enclosed harbour which you could walk around and some benches to sit and admire the view as well. We used to sit down looking out at the pleasant bay and fish for crabs; the only creature that prospered. They usually took the bait - a bit of bread rolled into a ball - then we could put them back in the water and go home safe in the knowledge that we were able fishermen.  

When I was able to start going further afield on my own, I travelled the Sussex coast when I had a day spare. I took advantage of it going to places like Bognor Regis, Littlehampton, Goring-by-sea, Worthing, Shoreham and finally Hove.  With a stash of vouchers for the bus from the tourist information office that would last the summer I would ride on the 700 bus. It took three hours to cross the county and I would start to explore places.

Bognor had a Butlins and the local paper gave away vouchers for cheap day tickets, so I would go with some friends of the family and have a long day out, I started with a bit of swimming followed by a game of pool and then we watched the free film. The films where those aimed at young families, some soppy film with animals going on some quest to rescue their human owners from some mine shaft or something ridiculous, most of the time I would be won over by a well told story but not always.

There weren’t any rollercoasters but it still had some rides that looked frightening enough, which meant I stuck to the carousel and the bumper cars. This was still a better day out than Hayling Island, where if we missed the bus home, we would have to start walking back until we saw the next bus. We also went on the train to Bognor. I have vague recollections of the IRA planting a bomb in a bin outside the Thomas Cook there days before we next went. Whenever I talk to my mum about this she can’t remember it.

Littlehampton is not far down the road and I’ve only stopped there a few times I don’t think there is much to recommend about the town. It is the home to the Body Shop and the first Blue Peter life boat. Even Goring-By-Sea, which has to have -by-sea tacked on the end so it isn’t confused with a place in Oxfordshire or a Nazi, is more interesting. The bookshop is named Jabberwocky Books and some of the street names are named after former Prime Ministers. It is also apparently where Oscar Wilde is thought to have got the inspiration for character names in a couple of plays, such as Lord Goring, and Jack Worthing, the latter from a rather fruitful trip to Worthing where he wrote The Importance of Being Earnest. There is a blue plaque in Worthing to commemorate this however it is now believed to be on the wrong building.

Worthing lives up to its reputation as a stopping off point for the elderly, especially on the bus. It was after we left the town centre and moving down the seafront that I would start to notice that old person smell. It wasn’t overpowering, but it was enough that if you had fallen asleep, you would know where you were if you woke up.

I once sat opposite two women one an American and one half Lebanese half Cypriote - I only know this because it was something they discussed in detail - who were talking about going to Shoreham. They had never been before and they thought that it would be a lovely English seaside resort. I felt I ought to tell them not to get their hopes up but, in the end I let them find out for themselves. Also where else are you supposed to sit on a horse other than its back? It is pleasant enough with an annual air show.  It is overlooked by the chapel of Lancing College which is made from the local sandstone and, as a result, is slowly crumbling despite the best efforts of conservationists.

I found a five pound note the first time I went to Hove. It was a dull day with drizzle in the air; I don’t know why we even went. I think we were supposed to go to Brighton, but ended parking further away than planned. Living in Crawley at the time, it seems rather surprising that we didn’t go more often. I wasn’t thrilled to be there that day and moped about walking down the seafront. The place was deserted. I walked past what I thought was an ice lolly wrapper. It then started to occur to me there aren’t many companies that use an image of the queen to promote their products. I turned back to find it was a five pound note.

Hove is a place I go back to often. At first it was to watch the cricket. Then as I got to know the place I would venture down George Street and look in the shops, an independent record shop was a favourite; they would have a number of tapes that were always worth looking at and even chart albums.

If anything I am quite unadventurous when it comes to most places, I find it hard to walk from Brighton to Hove without getting lost. I have found a number of different routes, none of them straightforward. Getting the bus from near the Brighton Pavilions, It took a route behind Brighton train station into the residential areas; it was like looking at the same place as described in graham Greene’s Brighton Rock. The cramped terraced housing is in evidence around the station and imagining the characters walking down the street isn’t hard to imagine. The buildings start to turn into apartments the closer to Hove you get, once past of Hove train station it turns into family homes and if you are unlucky enough you will find yourself among the mansions celebrities such as Adele, Heather Mills and Fat Boy Slim. Hove of course is seen as more gentile than its neighbour and Brighton and I like it that way. There is never any sense of urgency in either. But if anyone asks me where I am headed I will repeat that famous quote ‘Hove actually.’

I have started spending more time just sitting on the beach, next to the leisure centre there is a crazy golf course, I have never seen anyone play there but it is the indicator that I am in the right place. It isn’t crowed with people who have no respect for the area. There are not people dropping litter or being loud and disturbing other people’s enjoyment. Instead you get families on little impromptu educational visits looking for shells and interesting shaped pebbles that they can draw and put away in little wildlife collections. Don’t get me wrong there times when it is nice to sit further down the beach towards the two piers. The burnt out structure of The West Pier is a silhouette on the coast showing not just Brighton’s decline as a popular holiday destination but places all along the coast. It can be cheaper to spend a week abroad with more of a guarantee of seeing the sun.  

I have seen Portsmouth at all times of the year and I would have I like it best at winter. This is more than a decade ago; there wasn’t Spinnaker Tower then, a weird structure that can be seen across a decent part of the city. I liked to go walk down towards Southsea and watch the ferries leave and return. The lights that are visible give the place a feel of safety of routine. In the dark the sea can be dangerous. When you can’t see something it plays on the senses. You are more vigilant, and the sea does this to you. When the waves are agitated you know to stay out of its way but when they’re calm it gives no indication of its dangers. The sea usually gives a warning of the threat it possesses when you first dip your toe in. the coldness that shocks up your body even in summer says this is not a place to mess with.

The atmosphere is different by the sea during the winter. There is a something that changes whether it is that there are fewer people around, or the waves look more ominous. The light brown colours of the sand mix into waves and create an altered kind of feeling than those of the clearer blues and greens of summer.