Winchelsea beach

The promise of a fine sunny day lured us down again to East Sussex coast at the Rye Harbour Nature Reserve. We were last here betwixmas on a brilliant winter’s day.

The weather didn’t live up to promises as there was more cloud around than expected. Nevertheless, it didn’t spoil the day.

We fortified ourselves at the Discovery Centre cafe before walking along the coastal path to Winchelsea calling in at a couple of bird hides along the way. Plenty of birds on the pits and scrapes, flocks of lapwings, oyster catchers and other waders and waterfowl.

As the tide was on the way out on our way back we returned via the beach watching great rafts of waders feeding at the waters edge, all the time glancing back to see how the sunset was developing behind us.

The sunset wasn’t as spectacular as we’d hoped, too much cloud. It was good enough especially with the reflections of pink clouds on beach pools and wet sand.

I was Interested in how different the beach was today compared with our last visit in December. There was less firm packed sand and more scatterings of banks of shingle. Just goes to show what a dynamic environment a beach is - and we’ve had no storms rearranging materials since our last visit.

There were many candidates for todays blip. The extra was a very strong contender, the last shot at the end of the day as we left the beach for the walk back to the car park in the gathering gloom.