A Living in a Beach

It's one of the most memorable clips from a film which has a hundred, when Peter Reigert as Mac MacIntyre in 'Local Hero' is trying to obtain Ben Knox's beach and Ben, played by Fulton MacKay, having looked at postcards of the series of perfect beaches he's being offered in return, says, "I'm not sure there's a living in any of these beaches." The clip is here.

A good beach isn't just a pile of sand or pebbles, it has to have personality, which can come from its surroundings - like palm trees running along the back of it - or from what is washed up along its tideline, which is what Ben Knox was worried about, or if it's a beach from which a living can be made, as when boats set out from it to catch fish. Somehow beaches which are cliff-backed, enclosed in bays, have more personality, as have beaches with white sands as opposed, for example, to black. Lastly, it has to have life: nothing, not even a small crab, seems to live on this one.

Our local beach is one that Ben wouldn't have looked at. I have never come across a beach with less flotsam washed up on it, and what little does arrive is quickly picked up by a band of anxious litter-pickers. Even the pebbles, predominantly well-rounded flint, lack personality.

It does have some things going for it. Surf boarders and kite surfers enjoy it, though the few kayakers  I have seen pass look bored, and one can sit in a deck chair and watch....

....the occasional boat or ship sail by, but the water is brown rather than Caribbean blue and the back of the beach is lined with concrete and beach huts.

I'm put in mind of this because I've been going back through old photographs and came across a beach which I think Ben might have liked, except that it is largely covered at high tide and wouldn't be too hospitable in foul weather. It lies off the Tanzanian coast just to the south of Tanga.