It is warm and sunny with a brisk breeze and beautiful stormy skies. The sun, low in the sky, dazzles when you look south. To my dismay I discover I have left the memory card out of my Nikon so have to resort to my mobile phone for photos - the colours look weird and hyperreal - it is too beautiful to miss.
It is exactly high tide as I reach the beach south of the barricades and it is strange to find the plastics washing up right at my feet, straight from the sea. What's more it is a plastic cup tide! Fragments of plastic cups are washing up everywhere I look - 50 in total, just on my short walk.
There are a lot of ready-made
wildlife traps and drinks cans too.
Excitingly, I also find a tag from a Newfoundland lobster pot, dating from 1989 and having travelled over 2500 miles.
The shingle is banked up heavily in front of the Headlands, half submerging its fence.
A large digger approaches from the south, seemingly out of the blue, at speed along the shingle. I seize the dog and retreat up the bank just in time. Meanwhile the rain drives in.
low tide: 06.41 hrs 0.3m; high tide 12.57 hrs 2.7m
time of arrival: 12.41 hrs
weather: cloudy, wind W 18mph, temperature 11c
marine
litter: fragments of plastic cup (50 collected)... everywhere. More drinks cans than usual. Lobster pot tag from North America dating from 1989. One piece of paraffin wax.
