Apparently it’s not going to happen again for around a decade; that huge harvest moon we had on 17 September, if you were lucky enough to see it, was like an enormous glowing globe. It was a wonder to witness; but with it came an extremely low tide that we also wondered at and wandered along…

It had been sucked out to sea; the sea that is, sucked and pulled back from our shores to somewhere else

Exposing acres of kelp, rock pools and winkles that were being harvested by one family

But we walked on, past our usual rock-pooling place to a cove we had only once before visited because it is usually cut off

We reached the archway, the cathedral sized giant gateway to the other side that is rarely accessible, only at the lowest of low tides

We pass the scoured cliff face, softened by its grassy growth and on we go through…to the other side

I look back at the tidal portal through which we passed

Like enormous ancient ruins of long forgotten civilisations the pillared cliffs stand chiselled and worn

The gigantic slashed shifting cliff face like a conveyor belt that has seized up, looms over us

Bits are missing at the bottom giving way to caverns and caves with their dark mysterious pull

Others have been judiciously blocked by falling slabs or rising tides that shovel hefty heaps of stones into the gap

The rarely trodden beach cries for joy as trusting travellers crunch their way across its stony banks

Another slit in the cliff face where birds and bats nest safe in the knowledge they are unlikely to be disturbed

A thin doorway for a slim Jim, I could but I won’t, it’s too risky even for someone like me

The cormorants take a dim view of being disturbed, they’re not used to people passing close by

I look ahead to the next headland and wonder what lies beyond, the tide has turned but it still has a way to go before it cuts me off

The huge blocks of stone lie atop one another, carved by the sea and the storms, accepting their lot and self righteously remind us this is not the usual haunt of the beachgoer

But the more familiar and friendly limpets sit unmoved by the dominant influences around

And the seaweed fringes embedded into the long forgotten rock-fall hang freely

I look ahead to the next headland and wonder what lies beyond; I continue to wander

Until I reach the next beach. I think it’s Branscombe but the tide has turned and the cathedral watery doors will soon close

So I turn back, once more passing the placid limpets and hippy faced rocks

But the peace is suddenly broken as a small team of noisy motorised hang gliders appear from nowhere skirting around each cove

I bet the cormorants took a dim view of that