Beach or Mountains?

 RHYS BOWEN: I’ve just come back from two weeks on the beach in San Diego. Absolutely heavenly, (apart from five family members coming down with Covid, one after the other, necessitating confinement to various parts of the house we were renting, masks and eating outside. I find that beach time is something absolutely necessary for my sanity and peace of mind. Walking barefoot on warm sand while looking for shells, standing at the edge of the waves as they lap over my feet, sitting on the sand and running it through my fingers, or just watching the waves all sooth my soul.

When I am in and around water I feel truly at home. This is strange because I grew up in chilly England where the water is usually too cold for swimming and  beaches usually windswept. We often went to Wales and one year my father and I made a bet that we’d swim every day of the vacation. This involved driving the car onto the beach, shedding outer layers while still in the car, then sprinting to the water, gasping with shock as we dove in, sprinting out and back through the waves and then rushing back to the car, teeth chattering.  We did it but I can;t say it was fun.

But these days I love every minute of beach time. Gliding over the surface in my kayak, as the paddle dips effortlessly into smooth water, boogie boarding when the day is warm enough and the ocean not too rough or even snorkeling are all perfect for me. I was never really taught to swim but the moment I put fins on I became a mer-person. When I snorkel on coral reefs I lose all sense of time and place. I am fully engaged with the sea life around me, sometimes I little too fully. Once, in Grand Cayman, I followed the reef out, never looking up, not hearing John yelling that I was going too far. When I finally did look out the shoreline looked as if someone had drawn it with a pencil. I was really, really far out and there was nobody or nothing in sight. Just me and smooth ocean. Then it occurred to me that if a shark took me nobody would even see.  I made it safely back to shore but I have been a tad more careful since then.

I wonder what it is about the sea that draws us so much. In England lots of people drive to the seaside, then sit in their cars watching the waves. I too love to watch the waves at sunset, preferably with a glass of wine in my hand. Why are we so fascinated?  Is it something primeval, reminding us that we all originally came from the sea billions of years ago? 

Are you a beach person or do you prefer the mountains, or maybe you’re a city girl? What is your ideal vacation?

JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Water girl here, by inclination, geography and astrological sign. I live by a river, I’m a half hour’s drive from the ocean and I have a dear friend with a lakehouse (thanks, Celia!) Water - seeing it, being in it, hearing it - puts me in my happy place. 

One of the things I love about my pre-knee-replacement PT is that it’s done in a pool! This may be the first time I’ve ever been eager to go to physical therapy and disappointed when it’s done. Forty minutes exercising in that pool makes my whole day.

JENN McKINLAY: Beach, lake, river - even though I’m a fire sign, I love the water. I grew up alongside a river, a lake, and then the ocean in CT. The only reason I can survive in AZ is the time I spend at our beach cottage in Nova Scotia and our annual trip to San Diego. Also, we have a swimming pool. Gotta have water. That being said, I do love the mountains, but water is vacation for me. 

HALLIE EPHRON: Give me water, too. Among my fondest memories are body surfing in Malibu. And I love pools though I’m a terrible swimmer. Hold the boats. 

HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Beach beach beach. A big umbrella, a little back chair, the pelicans skimming over the water, a view of the vast uninterrupted horizon, a book, and only the sound of the waves. 

(I am not fond of the mountains, except from an airplane.) 

LUCY BURDETTE: count me in as a beach person too, although I’d say it’s more water than beach. Even though I am a Capricorn and deeply rooted to the earth! Our grandkids were here this past week, and they never wanted to get out of the water, spending hours in the Long Island sound and then transferring to a neighbor’s pool as soon as they got home. I am sure they will grow up being beach people. When I went off on a solo adventure after college, I had been planning to land in Boulder, Colorado. But I remember so clearly feeling that the mountains made me claustrophobic.

DEBORAH CROMBIE: Beach, here, too! I find the ocean incredibly soothing and love to be around water of any kind. Mountains, not so much. I understand that they're beautiful, but they just don't strike that chord with me. But give me the gentle rolling hills of southern England and I might even give up the beach...