Littleferry Beach

Approaching the village of Littleferry, the road is separated from the sea by a plantation, Ferry Woods, in the middle of which is a lochan, Loch Unes. On an exceptionally warm March morning we were reminded that, in summer, this small stretch of water is one of the best dragonfly sites in the area. Today it was surrounded by birdsong and inhabited by a couple of pairs of noisy mallard, probably staking out their territories.

The woods are a pleasant approach to....

....Littleferry Links and beach, the latter now...

....largely restored to its normal quantity of sand. We arrived about two hours after low tide so walked a shrinking beach, but with the warmth did not hurry and indulged in a little shelling....

....collecting various bivalves being washed up along the tideline. For the first time we paid some attention to the smaller ones, gathering as many colours and shades as we could and....

....arranging them on the sand. The bivalve may be the banded wedge shell, Donax vittatus, which is common around British shores. Judging by the pictures on various websites, we've done quite well in sampling the wide range of colours in which it occurs.

We were almost alone on the beach. Two people passed at a distance walking their dogs and a couple of kayakers came close in at the entrance to Loch Fleet, one of them calling out that paddling was hard work into the wind. Despite this, I was envious of them: a coastline is so different from the perspective of a kayak.