The Pier, a follow on from the last post.

In my last blog the sun was shining and although it was cold it was very Spring like. Last week that all changed, we had heavy snow which was almost blizzard like, and very strong Easterly winds. Deal is situated in the Downs, a narrow stretch of water between England and France. Directly opposite the town is the infamous Goodwin Sands, referred to in certain places as ‘Ye Shippe Swallower.’ Many a ship has met its watery grave on the Goodwin Sands, mainly because when we have North Easterly winds in the winter we really do know about it!

Even some of the railings have gone.

I have no idea how strong the wind was last Monday evening but I had to drive down to my brothers house to drop off his birthday card after work. I chose to drive along the seafront, it was just dark, it was one of the highest tides of the year and the wind was howling and it was snowing. If it had been light I would have stopped and taken some photos as I remember wild nights like this from my childhood. In some ways it is quite exciting but it can also be scary!

Some of the ripped up planking are lying in the corner.

I heard the next day that the pier had been damaged, but only managed to get down there this week, I think the photos speak for themselves, and you can see that grilles have done their job, whereas the wooden planking has been ripped up by the heavy sea, which was just about level with the bottom deck during the storm.

Needless to say the bottom deck of the pier is now closed off, I expect they will replace the planks with more grilles. There was another very high tide today, again the sea was level with this lower deck, I expect there will be more damage.

As mentioned in the last blog virtually all the imported shingle in this part of the town has gone, also large boulders and tons more shingle were deposited at the north end of the town, so I went to see how much shingle, if any was left down there, again you can see by the photos that the boulders are all still in place round the remains of Sandown Castle, but every bit of the imported shingle has been washed away!

Boulders at the Northern end of the town, but no shingle.

Looking inland from the beach the Royal Cinque Ports Golf Club can be seen.

Finally a photo of the site of Sandown Castle, when we were children I am pretty sure there was still part of the castle wall on the seaward side of this terrace, this has all gone now.