Cuckmere Haven and Seven Sisters

Yesterday we drove over the border into Sussex to Cuckmere Haven - we had a picnic! SuperZibbetMeerkat refused to come out of the camera cosy, it really was chilly.

You know the old saying about not pulling faces in case you get stuck like it when the wind changes? Well, the wind is always from the sea here. And I guess the trees pull faces...



We've visited here many times but on the walk down to the sea we saw more birds than ever before - at least four little egrets



a heron:



The heron was being mobbed by seagulls who presumably thought he was on their turf, they kept flying at him but all he did was duck his head each time.

We heard a weird swooshing sound and looked up to see a swan flying over our heads - I had no idea their wings made a sound!

The sun on the sea was stunning...



Looking across to Seven Sisters, we wondered why the cliffs were so-called. It turns out they're named after seven sisters who each had a house on the separate cliffs.



Finally, the meerkat decided he'd try his paw at cliff-climbing. The cliffs here are similar to the famous White Cliffs of Dover further along the coast, but have horizontal layers of flint making handy paw holds. They're MUCH too dangerous for people to climb with regular landfalls.




While we were visiting my mother before going home again there was about 5 minutes of snowfall...and our 90 minute drive home took three and a half hours! ouch!

Lots of bees...and Seven Sisters

Yesterday, as some of you will know, we met some bees when out walking. Some of them tried to take up residence in my hair. This relocation did not meet with my approval, in fact I think it would be fair to say I was in a state of panic! Three of the little darlings had stung me before MrNifty had the presence of mind to pour our drinking wter over my head (not his usual way of endearing himself, but it worked a treat)

Today's walk was therefore NOWHERE near bees.

We went to look for a geocache at Cuckmere Haven. This is a fabulous spot where a river meanders down to the sea - I took class field trips there to look at longshore drift (and paddle!)



Annoyingly we'd walked the mile to the beach before our GPS announced we were on the wrong side of the river...so back we went. It was a gloriously sunny day though, so no complaints.





At the top of the cliff was a memorial to a wartime tragedy.



I'm not sure if you'll be able to read it, even after clicking to enlarge - so here's the gist. A Canadian company pitched camp in the field at the top of the cliffs in 1940, Corporal Leslie Edwards, a local man, warned them that the bombers used the area as a navigation point but his advice was ignored. Two days later, along came the bombers and everyone was killed.


I'm completely staggered that the officer didn't pay atttention to local knowledge - very "Black Adder".



The cliffs you can see in the photo are the Seven Sisters, each "sister" being one of the lumpy sticky out bits! It's a great place for wildlife, we watched two pairs of little egrets fishing. However, it's under threat. There's a scheme to reflood the area to take the pressure of flood plains that have been built on. The jury is still out.