23rd March from the West Cliff Green, Bournemouth
A strong buffeting wind crumples the sea up like an old crisp packet. The jagged ridges of of water snarl against the sand and try to smother it in a mass of white. A crow barks at a passing dog. Another crow watches me approach from the rail and only flies off as I reach it with a look of complete disdain. The sky is covered in broken slate grey clouds that allow the sun very occasional glimpses of the world below. The patches where the grass was scorched in the drought last summer are now obvious as the lush green grow up around them but daisies have colonised them in profusion. The first mass of flowers are in the sheltered places where the three cornered leeks grow but even here the wind rakes them flat.
From 23rd March 2022
The wind has dropped and the sun has shone all day. But the air is still spring fresh and the waves land with a regular swoosh on the flat sand. Suddenly, everyone decides it's summer and the grass is dotted with people lying out reading, exercising or just enjoying the sun. The paths are filled with amblers and strollers. But it is still early in the year and by the time the sun has gone it is bitterly cold and the West Cliff is empty again. The blackbird finishes its evensong and all is quiet again. #bournemouth #westcliffgreen #spring #March
From 23rd March 2021
In the grey dawn a little procession of rattling, banging bulldozers and excavators drag the big rusty iron sand pipes to a new location further down the beach. Meanwhile the tugs and workboats out in the bay perform an intricate ballet adagio to reposition the undersea connector pipes. The new sand has been graded and levelled by the machinery; now, it only needs the work of the sea and thousands of human feet for the final smoothing and planishing. On the clifftop the twittering and warbling of small birds is so dense it is impossible to tell one individual from another. A pigeon, fed up with just sitting and cooing, swoops off and claps his wings with a sharp report in the cold morning air.
