Not so happy Happisburgh

We headed for the coast today and ended up at Happisburgh. I've been going there ever since I could drive a car (which, as I've just insured a car I know to be 22 years), but every time we head that way I can never remember quite where it is. I think my brain is now full, so to take onboard new information it has to lose information, like routes to the seaside.

It was the first Norfolk beach Olive went to according to Caryn, which is probably right as it's always been one of my favourites. I thought we took her to Wells first, but my memory is currently dumping that sort of information. Have I mentioned that?

Anyway, Happisburgh was a sorry sight today. It's very rapidly disappearing into the sea. Costal Concern Action Group have a fantastic website which is well worth 15 minutes of your day if you'd like to know more. You hope something can be done, but you fear it's all a bit King Kanute.

The huge wooden groynes - erected in the late Fifties - have completely failed. They were still intact when we moved here five years ago, as was the slipway down the beach. The lifeboat station is still at the top of the rapidly receding cliff with no way to the sea. Bizarre.


To get to the sea on our first visit with Olive, you had to climb wooden steps over the groynes. I guess they'd have been eight, maybe 10 feet tall. Today, the top of them are waist-height, the rest is buried under beach. That the whole lot is going to be gone before our daughter makes double figures is a sobering thought.