Shoreham-by-Shit

So, today suggested to my girlfriend that we might visit RSPB Adur Estuary, as I needed something to write about here, and running around Brighton was garnering me nothing but yarking seagulls of varying degrees of immaturity.

I thought it would be a nice trip out...

The bus trip there took us through the nice parts of Hove, and then the less nice, and then through Portslade and Southwick which contrary to my quaintly romantic view of Sussex, all Downs and posh, turned out to be hideous dumps where pram faces and Croydon Facelifts competed for squawking space on the bus, and the most scenic thing scene was an out of town shopping centre dropped on the landscape like a crashed ship from "Independance Day".

Shoreham didn't start promisingly, with pebble dashed bungalows and dispiriting looking playgrounds, but I was assured the town centre was nicer just as long streaks of rain appeared on the bus windows like the prick marks you find on some kinds of shortbread.

We arrived in the town centre, cold biting through us the second we got off the bus, with no idea of really where the hell we were going. Luckily my gf was able to guide us, and we walked over the Adur on the road bridge before turning on the path by the salt marsh. I figured that was it, and looked eagerly for interesting birds; Egrets and waders!

And what did I see? Bloody nothing but immature seagulls AGAIN and a couple of bored looking crows surrounded by mud. The houseboats were really quirky and interesting; loved the big former torpedo boats and the barge with a bus stuck on top of it.

The wildlife, however, was keeping a low profile. Unless you count a black and white cat with a gammy leg.

Eventually we followed the path right round to the unttractive footbridge and just got the bus home utterly fed up. It just wasn't our day, and I felt unjustly crappy about the town and its invisible birds. To add to this feeling, we took a quick detour onto the beach and found several dead cut up codling, and a discarded dogfish that should have been put back rather than left high and dry on the flinty stones. An unhappy sight.

I will never igonre her advice about day trips again! Ever! But in spring, I shall return! And all will be well.