Dreaming of sunny beaches . . .

I've just seen the weather forecast for the next few days and, dear reader, I wish I hadn't bothered! Although the sun is shining at the moment, the forecast is to get wetter and colder, turning to snow by Friday. Now, having been in a state of somnolent semi-hibernation for a while I had started to move to the front of the cave as the sun showed itself more and more. With the latest forecast I need to creep towards the back of the cave once more, where I can let the rest of the Winter pass me by a little!

In reality that's impossible to do of course, for there's too much to be done! However, one thing that I can do is indulge myself a little by thinking about warm sunny beaches. Two kinds come immediately to mind; firstly those from my aeons-ago childhood, and those that I would like to go to before total decrepitude takes over (in other words, before I'm too old to appreciate such things!).

Of the former, I can recall family holidays spent year after year around the Bournemouth/Boscombe area of the south coast. There are many memories of those times which spring readily to mind. I recall the joy of the first glimpses of the sea as we neared our destination, rushing to the beach as soon as I could after we'd arrived, beach picnics which always seemed to contain sand somewhere in the food, and woollen bathing suits --- one-piece --- that stretched as soon as they were wet! I recall too much time in the sun without cream, and the price that would be paid for it (now that's a painful memory), ice-creams that were melted by the hot sun before you managed to eat them, and endless treks between the hotel and the beach. In the mornings the trek between the two seemed to go by quickly, yet not quickly enough for our eager little bodies, but when it came time to turn round and go back to the hotel at the end of the session, OH! how our legs seemed to ache from what seemed to be the longest haul in the WHOLE WORLD!!! The two weeks seemed to be endless at first, but as our bodies browned in the summer sun and we moved into the middle of the second week, the last few days seemed to rush by far too fast. How blessed we were, and yet how little we realised it at the time. I thought that every child had more or less the same sort of summer holiday, and it was only as I grew older that I realised just how tremendously privileged we had been. That realisation makes the memories of those holidays all the warmer now, for I realise that they must have been arranged at great cost, especially when all seven of us siblings were taken along.

It's one thing to look back of course, but it's good to look forward at the same time. That way you avoid getting trapped in the past. Recently my attention was drawn to the lovely beaches and seascapes of North Carolina, and I must admit that I hope to be able to visit at some point in the future to discover the delights 'skin-to-sand' so to speak. Anyway, to conclude this morning's blog, here's a few pictures of great beaches that I would welcome as future memories!