There’s a warm mist lying over the bay. It diffuses the floodlights of St Helen’s into a soft, ambient glow, turning the whole sky silver. In the half-light of dusk, people are lighting fires on the beach, so that the crisp sea-salt air is warmed with woodsmoke. In the dunes, a couple kiss. At the shoreline, an old man walks a young dog. If you find the right spot on the coast road, all that can be heard is the tumble of surf, the yapping of the pup, and a distant, lonely foghorn.
And I remember why I loved this place, and why I may yet do so once again.
