Monochrome day

At eve, along the river bank,
The mist-crowned ripples lure me on
To think how all antiquity
Has floated down the stream and gone!
Xue Ying

People have settled our estuary for thousands of years. Neolithic agriculturalists, Beaker People, Romano-Britains, helmeted Angles and Saxons have farmed and fished and settled by the tidal waters. All have left souvenirs behind - little bits of pottery and metal and bone as signatures of that lost past existence.

But if they looked out over the river they would still recognise it today.

One day we - the Plastic People, or the Petroleum People or the Prodigal People - will be dead and gone, reduced to no more detritus than remains of all these past vanished hordes.

And the estuary will still carry on looking much the same

(By the way, I'm not taking black and white footage here, its actually unaltered full colour. Its just that the winter estuary is often monochrome).