BURNING AMBITIONS

The English are to beach life what John Sergeant was to

Strictly Come Dancing. Sarah Tucker explores the riddle of the sands

 

Work this one out. Every week, at my local gym, I observe a sea of

men and women with their personal trainers, pedalling, spinning and

kickboxing their way to a peak of physical perfection. Yet whenever I find myself on the beach in the South of France, I never see these toned folk at all. Perhaps it’s because they all have their own holiday homes, or even – knowing the clientele at this club – their own private sandyplage.

Even so, no matter where I am, I can always spot the Englishman on a beach.

Whatever the weather – rain, wind, hail or heat – he will be out in it, fighting them on the beaches with a grim determination that would make Winston Churchill proud. Admittedly, we Brits see the sun less often than most, which may account for our excess of adulation when we do. I remember once visiting Turkey when it was so hot – think oven on at regulo plenty – that the government closed all its offices for a week and innumerable chickens died. Whether the second event was directly consequential upon the first is

anyone’s guess. Either way, while fowl and bureaucrat floundered, the nutty English struggled on, baking, burning and dehydrating in their own inimitable way. The results were unedifying in the extreme: a beach is one place where few people look prettier in pink. Another sure sign of an Englishman on

the beach is the noise. The art of gliding silently across the sand with minimal fuss, exuding confidence and stealth, has yet to establish itself in the standard Anglo- Saxon repertoire. Especially not in the case of short people, who – for some curious evolutionary reason – invariably have the loudest voices. I may be lying at the other end of the Cap D’Antibes, but if my fellow beach dwellers are English and under five foot five, I will still be able to get the low- down on Heather’s hysterectomy or Tracey’s stunning GCSEs.

 

Furthermore, the English almost all behave as though they’ve never previously encountered sand. Apparently fearful of being sucked in by this alien substance, they tiptoe tentatively across the strand to the most inconspicuous spot they can find– unless, of course, they are short, in

which case the very concept of lying low is about as appealing as prohibition to a brewer.

 

Yet despite the English beach preference for avoiding the limelight, we invariably choose a spot with a good view of everyone else. To the English, a beach is essentially a widescreen TV for which the licence comes free of charge. We are a nation of beach voyeurs, watching furtively as those of less decorous stock have their uninhibited fun in the sun. And why not? On the beach, there is plenty to see – and, in certain countries, much of it is legalised porn. For me, the world’s best ‘body watching’ beaches are in Brazil, closely followed by those in Sydney, where bikinis and trunks leave just enough to the imagination, and where the concept of a beach bum takes on a whole different slant. And then there’s California, from which I’ve just returned.

This too is replete with the honed and the toned.

As for nudist beaches, you won’t find the best bodies here, but you will see more of them. Furthermore, everyone is very polite and deeply aware of personal space. No one looks intently at anyone else. In fact, by a none-too-gentle irony, nudist beaches provide the ultimate proof of what every red-blooded man and woman instinctively knows: that wearing a little

something is infinitely sexier than pitching up in nothing at all.

So, if you’re thinking of baring all on the beach this summer, don’t be tempted

to have a peek in the neighbouring dune. Take a good book instead.

 

All beached up: Sarah’s top tips

 

For children a beach is a beach, whether it’s in California or Cornwall. As long as their parents are there playing with them – or, in the case of teenagers, paying for them – they’ll have fun. But for the best and safest beaches, look for the Blue Flag eco-label, awarded worldwide to over 3,200 beaches and marinas. Visit: www.blueflag.org

 

Don’t pitch your spot too close to other

people. Think ‘mind the gap’. Leave enough room for people to pass, but not

enough for other families or couples to pinch the space in between.

 

Dress for your size and shape, not for fashion. That’s what other cultures do.

But don’t cover up – it’s a beach, for goodness sake, so be brave! With

properly fitting gear, you won’t even want to cover up. In any case, no one will

be looking – except the other English.

 

Don't stay on the beach all day. Take two hours for lunch, to cool down, talk to each other (eek!) and give the skin a rest. You’ll still get your money's worth.

SETTING SAIL

Every year thousands of Brits spend their holidays afloat. But what happens when shipmates fall out? Sarah Tucker finds that it isn’t all plain sailing at sea

 

I’m a landlubber. Don’t ask me why. Perhaps I’ve watched Titanic or The

Perfect Storm a few too many times, not to mention The Poseidon Adventure. Like most people, I had enormous admiration for Dame Ellen MacArthur when she sailed single-handed around the world. But although I would be game for a great many challenges, that is not one of them. Notwithstanding my own reservations, however, the popularity of ‘learn to’ sailing holidays has soared by 50% in recent years, thanks to the professionalism of companies

such as Sunsail (www.sunsail.co.uk) and Neilson(www.neilson.co.uk). In addition, the likes of Minorca Sailing (www.minorcasailing.co.uk), Wildwind

(www.wildwind.co.uk) and Seafarer Sailing (www.seafarersailing.co.uk) specialize in particular regions. And, of course, there are the canal and long boat holidays on which the pace is slightly slower; less demanding

on the reflexes than the ocean-going capers for which Dame Ellen is famed.

But beware: sailing can seriously damage your relationships. A few years back I hired a boat with Crown Blue Line (www.crownblueline.com) on the stunning Canal du Midi in France (www.canal-du- midi.org). It was four-berth, spotlessly clean and very comfortable, and after about half an hour of instruction on how to start, stop and steer it, the three intrepid mariners – my son, my boyfriend and I –were let loose with this £40,000 vessel, armed with barrels of enthusiasm and not much else.

 

Drifting blissfully towards the oyster beds of the Étang de Thau and the colourful seaside town of Sète, I noticed a curious phenomenon. At every lock we approached a war of words was under way, as the canal boats jostled for position. The English queued patiently; the Italians pushed in; the French had no concept of queuing at all. The cacophonous sound of multi-lingual swearing filled the balmy Languedoc air. Nor was the verbal sparring confined to the battles between boats: as often as not, it was couples and families in the same floating paradise that were going at it hammer and tongs. At the start of the week the crew would be happy enough; by

the end it was mutinous, with at least one member walking along the towpath rather than spend another moment aboard. If communication with your partner is already poor, this kind of holiday stands every chance of breaking the relationship altogether.   I witnessed so many screaming matches between I presume normally loving couples, relationship counsellors would do well to hold surgeries or at least advertise at the many port stops and locks on route.   Harbour masters and in one case a mistress pulled out their hair at the haphazard way in which novices like ourselves tried to navigate between expensive yachts and fishing boats, shouting at us as though we were trying to park a smart car in an empty car park and failing at all turns.  Our boat managed to bash into three yachts and a dingy, leaving that particular harbour mistress completely speechless. Either that or she had shouted so much she’d been left without voice. She simply stared at us as we finally managed to find our mooring, looking stony faced and incredulous.  We only stayed one night there although strangely all the yachts decided to leave that night, probably for fear of accruing even more damage during our departure. 

 

But at least on this type of boat one can get off pretty well whenever and wherever one likes. Not so with full-scale cruising. The monumental floating palaces that patrol the azure sea may seem like luxury hotels, but checking out is no easy task. Come to blows with your spouse in the middle of the Indian Ocean and you’re in for the full 12 rounds. Of course, it’s better if the ship is a large one, enabling the fugitive partner to get lost amongst the crowds. When my son was about seven, we went on a Royal Caribbean (www.royalcaribbean.co.uk) cruise around Mexico and Miami. At each

brief stop I chose an itinerary that would give us both a taste of the local wildlife.

 

Searching for alligators, swimming with dolphins and stingrays, we hurriedly made the most of our pause. Had we been so inclined, however, we could happily have remained on the ship, where the entertainment was such that many passengers never went ashore at all. Plied with twenty four hour food in such proportions that I didn’t want to eat anything, they made full use of the ever lasting buffet although the extensive gym and fitness studio remained eerily empty and ghost-like for the duration of our stay.   Why hang out with a dubious bunch of reptiles, they reasoned, when on board there were climbing walls, an ice rink and nightly shows that wouldn’t have disgraced the West End?

 

Yet the fact remains: once the ropes are untied, you’re trapped. This was brought home to me years ago when I went on a Star Clipper trip (www.starclipper.co.uk) off Thailand. It’s a very good company

and, as small cruises go, this one could scarcely have been bettered. After a while, however, it became apparent that one couple on board could barely stand to be on the same planet, let alone the same ship. The bloke had had a fling with someone else on the first night, his girlfriend had discovered them, and for the next seven days the three protagonists were forced to

exist in excruciating proximity. The couple’s cabin – wouldn’t you just know

it? – was right next to mine, and night after night, like scenes from Dynasty or Dallas, the screaming matches dragged on into the dawn. There was no escape for any of us. And that’s the problem with cruising.

Rarely is there time to learn much about the places one visits, but I guarantee that you will learn a great deal about each other. Perhaps that’s why Dame Ellen chose to sail the world alone. Forget Cape Horn. Hell is other people.

 

MARATHON FEAT

 

As I write, I’ve just completed the marathon. It took the best part of

five hours and I have nothing but admiration for those who habitually push

themselves through the pain barrier, often to raise money for good causes. I saw a side of London that I hadn’t previously known existed: a positive, supportive collective in the face of adversity, all pushing in the same direction for good. But it wasn’t just the seething mass of diversely attired runners who found themselves caught up in a marathon this spring: it was also the multitudes of unsuspecting travellers who fell foul of the now notorious ash cloud, as a bankrupted, vilified Iceland finally got its own back on

the world.

 

Call me irresponsible, but I loved it. For one glorious April week, with no planes flying over Richmond and surrounds, the din of the 21st Century gave way to sweet peace and quiet. The chance to hear oneself think, to be woken up by the heady sound of birdsong – rather than the Boeing 747 from Toronto – was a wonder beyond compare. For a short while each morning the silence was deafening, until the daily gaggle of bare-chested builders

descended upon our street to resume its reconstruction of the world.  Yes there were the trains and cars but somehow it seemed natural and right to have nothing hovering overhead for the first time in I don’t know how many years.  

 

Nor was this crisis of the air lanes without its comic side. I couldn’t help but

smile at the idea of the British Airways boss going up in a ‘tester’ plane to see if it was safe to fly. If it had crashed, presumably, we would all have rested in

peace – some of us for eternity. It didn’t, of course, and on the seventh day the aviatorial powers – prompted, perhaps, by the horror of losing millions of pounds –decreed that we were dealing, after all, with the right sort of volcanic ash. Normal service was duly restored. By then, however, we had succeeded in creating a drama out of a crisis. In the absence of real mountains, we Brits are generally forced to make our own out of molehills. Yet here was a deluxe kind of mountain that obligingly exploded before our eyes. It was one of those surreal tales generally confined to the pages of an improbable thriller. Only this time it was for real.

 

But the story wasn’t the ash cloud itself: it was the variety of ways – ranging from the lacklustre to the positively intrepid –in which those stranded overseas decided to make their way home. Some saw no reason to rush and decided to stay put in paradise. An extra week in San Francisco or the Maldives, or a routine week commuting on the tube? You choose. TV crews trawling the beauty spots of the world had a hard time finding Mr Angry, as the great shutdown became the perfect excuse for indolence underpinned by a

stoical rationale. The British, true to form, were the most indolent of all. As one traveller smugly put it: “We are all pawns of nature.”

 

Others ordered taxis – celebs and self- important business people, mainly, who forgot the truism that no one, but no one, is unexpendable, and who felt that a few grand spent on getting home was worth it for the sake of the few more they would lose if they didn’t make some sort of effort.

 

Then there were those who took whatever planes were flying to get as near home as they could, progressing from Cyprus to Rome to Prague as though travelling to Waterloo from Liverpool Street via Bank. Others again hitched lifts up the motorway through Spain and France on the kind of articulated lorry normally scowled upon by British drivers, or even hired a car for themselves. This, however, proved distinctly uneconomic: I know of one man who paid £3,000 for the pleasure of being driven back home. But at least it

was safer than hiring a glider, as another of my acquaintances tried to do.

 

And then, of course, there were the folk who hitched a lift with Celebrity Cruises, sailing back from Bilbao in northern Spain on the new luxury liner Celebrity Eclipse. The vessel will now be forever known as the ‘rescue’ ship – which, as epitaphs go, is one up on that of Titanic. Curiously, the

launch of the ship – celebrations for which were put on hold during the unscheduled mission of mercy – had received scant coverage until the volcano spluttered in ire.

 

Everyone, it seems, was summoned to the rescue of our countrymen abroad. A friend of mine at the Press Association was inundated with calls and emails beseeching him to organise boats and trains for the collection of the stranded masses. He’s a travel editor, by the way. That means that he doesn’t actually do anything – he simply writes about those who do. But finally we sent in the Navy – or Mr Brown did, no doubt enjoying the last vestiges of power as he sailed into a sunset of his own – and soon everyone was safely back home, noses to the grindstone and grumpy with it. I should know, because the day after ‘normal’ life resumed, and the planes began drowning out the thrushes

once more, I met an obnoxious banker – ill fitting suit and lazy left eye - on the tube who chided me for not telling my son to give him his seat. In truth, the guy didn’t look old enough to warrant it – he just looked tanned and smug and annoyed there was no business class on the tube.   Such a shame he wasn’t one of the stranded souls who stayed put.