A little bit of Whitsand Bay all to ourselves and I swam in the sea for the first time in years !!!
We've been experiencing unusually warm weather in my neck of the woods and in most of the UK so we decided to make the most of it this weekend by going to the beach. We visited a beach a couple of weeks back and the water quality wasn't particularly good due to it being close to a river and inside the Plymouth breakwater so this time we decided to head down to Cornwall.
Whitsand Bay stretches for around 5 miles around the coast and we parked in a small carpark along the cliff and decided to walk down to the beach.
Here's a photo of the family just after we arrived at the carpark. (Our car is the second in from the left in case anyone is interested). We forgot to bring our parasol which is why my son is holding an umbrella so we could use it to shade Ted (our dog).
As we started our descent down the cliffs I noticed that Whitsand Bay was a 'Haven for wildlife' ;-)
Great views from the path.
As we started to get nearer to the beach, the path became more overgrown and treacherous and then we reached a sign that my girlfriend wasn't too happy to see.
We took the dangerous cliff path and headed down through even more overgrown paths until eventually, we reached the beach.
Here's a video of the beach.
and a picture
I don't usually swim in the sea in the UK but the water was warmer than I ever remember it being so I swam in the sea for the first time for years and it was invigorating.
Here's a picture to prove it although it is so blurry it could be anyone but it really is me I promise, and my daughter is next to me.
What a great day !!!
Thanks for reading.
Stay safe
Jim
Thanks for sharing your day with us, Jim. That is such an amazing and secluded spot! How beautiful! So nice that you got back in touch with the ocean. You are an island nation, after all!...lol...
Lovely family too, my friend....though your son reminds me of "The Headless Horseman" for some reason I can't quite put my finger on...
Here's my big one-penny upvote!...lol...
Thanks for taking the time to comment. Considering that I live so close to the ocean I really should get back in touch with it more often. If the Geoengineers keep the temperatures high I will be visiting again soon to swim again.
Headless Horseman lol. He insisted on leaving the umbrella up while we walked through narrow overgrown paths almost destroying it. Bloody kids !!!
I love em !!!
Thanks for the upvote. As they say, "Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves".
Anything new out at the allotment?
The beetroot, peas, leeks are doing ok but the sweetcorn isn't doing particularly well. I think I should have added more manure/fertiliser to the soil last year. It's very hot and dry here at the moment so not been working on it as much as I should and mainly been going up there to water it. I need to devote a couple of weekends to getting the whole plot turned over and mixed with manure ready for next year but finding the time is difficult because when I do get time I want to do stuff with the family like go to the beach.
My cherry trees are doing ok but I think I am going to wait until next year at least before I get any fruit off them. The Rhubard is doing ok too but Rhubard seems to grow anywhere without too much difficulty. I will keep persevering.
What I would love to do is grow indoors in my loft hydroponically using LED lights as I am concerned that the soil and produce is contaminated with heavy metals from whatever they are spraying in the skies. The initial outlay is too great at the moment though. If I did it I would want to do it properly and completely control the temps/humidity/CO2 etc.
Wow. Thanks for the update! I've never had very good luck growing corn either. You're right, they are very nutrient-dependent, and I have lousy soil here.
Do you have a water source at the plot, or do you have to haul in the water?
I've never even considered hydroponics here, because our electricity is so expensive (.15 quid per KwH) and our house is COLD in the winter time except the rooms near the wood stove, which are our more "public" rooms...LR, DR....and not suitable for any such schemes.
Good luck the rest of the growing season. Looks like it may be a long one.
There are self filling water troughs scattered around and I have one right next to my plot which is pretty handy. It still takes me a while to water my plot though using my 7 litres watering can. There has been talk of fitting a hose attachment to the ballcock system that fills the troughs as it would save a lot of time if we could use a hose but nothing happened so far. The local council would frown on the idea so we would have to do it in a clandestine manner.
My electricity/gas price can be seen below and don't appear to be much less than yours but there are rumours that the prices will be rising soon.
Ideally, I'd like to fit a 4kW solar array to my roof and use that to power LED lights but again, can't currently afford it and also, I'd get very little power in the winter. LED lights are pretty efficient these days and produce very little heat but I would probably need to install a small airconditioning system if I did it in my loft as it's very hot up there in the summer and very cold in the winter.
Thanks for the good luck wishes. Hopefully the good weather continues.
About 500 quid per year for electric? Man that's less than half of what I pay. I pay about $1300-1400 per year for electric, about $200 for propane for our stove/oven...and then we could talk heating costs..about $3000-3500 per anum...(mostly wood but also $1000-1500 in fuel oil in that number.) I can't compare your gas costs, of course, because there's no estimated usage shown.
If you carried two water cans, wouldn't that double the speed of the watering task?
Yea...anything you can afford that cuts costs is great. Have you looked into heat pumps?
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Thanks for posting.
Love UK. ♥
Thanks for replying.
Nice post you
Thanks
Your are welcome 👍
Thank you for your continued support of SteemSilverGold
So, you have a private beach! It is good to float a little on the ocean. It is fun.
I had forgotten how good it feels to swim in the sea. At one with mother earth. It was a great day. Thanks for taking the time to comment
Aww, you guys all look so great, what a happy day. I'm glad you took the chance to get some vitamin SEA Jim, and yeah I believe that is your mug I see, blurred as it is, out there in the water.
Thanks for taking clip too, I can never get tired of that sound...when the tide goes back out and it like sucks the sand...just perfect.
Vitamin SEA !!! I like it.
Thanks for taking the time to read and reply (again). Always appreciated.