Long-exposure photograph of Charlie's Garden, Collywell Bay, Seaton Sluice, Northumberland, England | ISO 100 | 61 mm | f/22 | 70 sec. Each time we visit the village, we call at Castaways Tea Room, which reminds us of the long-running BBC Radio 4 programme Desert Island Discs. The name and atmosphere refer to a faraway island, although the place is often full of people, but strangely, this doesn’t bother us. We enjoy a Dirty Bean on Sourdough Toast as breakfast, have juicy bites in a Naanwich of the Day as lunch or relish a Turmeric and Coconut Oat Latte with a slice of whatever cake as a just in-between. The table with the two low yellow seats at the big window - the place was an army supplies store before - is our favourite spot, mainly because when the sun is out, this feels like paradise. You can look towards the steep footpath leading to Collywell Bay from the window. There, twice a day, the tides hit the with concrete reinforced high rocks and a sandstone pinnacle, about 100 feet from the beach, initially connected to the mainland before being eroded by the sea. In the background, nearly at the horizon, a row of off-shore wind turbines represent modern times. The rock is known as Charlie’s Garden and is named after Charles Dockwray, a local who cultivated the top of the rock. He must have had mountaineering skills to reach the top. And, I wonder what he grew. Maybe potatoes and other vegetables salted by the spray of the sea?

Charlie's Garden, Collywell Bay, Seaton Sluice, Northumberland, England

ISO 100 | 61 mm | f/22 | 70 sec.

Seascape series Leaving the Land

Read Charlie's Garden story in the alt text

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