Portobello Beach Edinburgh Day 227

The man with spade who ushers in the spring! For the first day in ages I think the warmer weather has finally arrived!

The subject of my blip has worked for 30 years for the Council spending most of his time "in the season" battling to keep Portobello Beach an attractive proposition. He was using his shovel to shift the sand off the promenade. He also had a JCB for the more accessible parts of the promenade. His coworker was down the beach driving the sand rake tractor.

In his work over the years he has seen far worse storms than this year's. Removed deceased porpoises, dolphins, horses and deer. He was grateful for the fact that the stranded whale last August was not on his patch as "that would have taken some clearing up". He pointed to two locations where humans have been washed up and told me about the women who ran screaming to him having found a "child's hand" on the beach. He calmed her down and pulled the five fingered seaweed out of sand. He also had a close encounter with a giant crab that suddenly came to life in front of his tractor but was unable to move before being struck by one of his wheels. I will be more wary running at low tide now in case I meet one of these rock like monsters who might find my trainers less of a threat.