We camped on lank grass, three fields from the sea. On the breezy shore we got into our Speedos, then scratched poems in the sand. A Boots print holds the poets, in youth’s skinniness smiling, cooled by faded sunshine, proud of their words.
Next day opened milky grey and breezy. A pub on the map four miles away. The wind flapped hard as we opened its door. We finished our pies as rain spasms spat with contempt on the glass and swirled over the tarmac. Back along the main road, shoals of wet dampening our beer-glow, rivulets down our necks. And wind too, in gusts shoving us along unsteadily, as cars passed too close and open-mouthed children in them stared through breath-shrouded windows. We turned through the gate and was it the right place? As there was nothing there now, no tents or cars or caravans. Just one orange canvas, flattened, and our rucsacs, upside down, like stranded beetles. John laughed and took a photo.
There was little shelter on the platform and the wires whistled overhead as we shivered and ate a Mars bar. On the train someone mentioned a hurricane.
Years later my wife told me that as we were laughing in that broken field, she was a few miles up the same coast, with her best friend, surveying a different deserted campsite and a similar flattened tent.