Coal picking

As I seem to want to take photographs again I called in at the beach for an hour yesterday. Unusually the tide was not only 'in' but high enough to cover the sand right up to the sea wall. Among the usual detritus of the disposable society washed up on the strandline was the Irish Sea coal, black amongst the broken razorfish shells. With all but a narrow strip of the beach covered in sea there was just one chap on the sand. He was carefully picking out the larger lumps of coal for his fire.

As with many of the regular coal pickers he had his means of transporting his gleanings home sorted out.

This is the sort of activity which goes unreported in the usual course of seaside documentary photography. Local people doing stuff that they, and others before them, have been doing for years.The kind of thing that local government generally tries to put a levy on.

Cockle pickers have to buy a licence. Kitesurfers are likewise restricted. It can't be right for people to gather and use a horribly polluting fuel for free!

Did I wish I had a zoom fitted while taking these shots? Not at all. The trusty 28 was just the ticket. Partly, I'm sure, because when you use one focal length for long enough you stop seeing pictures that require something different. While this is limiting in one way it also concentrates your mind and vision by ruling out distracting alternatives.

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