Very frosty in the morning, but a bright sunny day. Cold wind from the west so I decided to go to the East side of Portland where we would be out of the wind and in the sunshine.
When we got to the cove I decided that stacks would be a good idea. There were very few people about and the beach was ours to play with. I’ve always loved this bay; it has a unique quality to it as has a lot of the landscape of Portland. Stacks suited this beach on this day. I find that stacks are very powerful images as they look so solid and long lasting because of the material they are made of, but are in fact, very temporary structures.
I like the feeling of groups of three, there sis a completeness about them. As I point out in the Celtic section, three is a very powerful number to the celts. I feel that three is an important number to me, I like the rythmic quality when triple time is used in music for example.
The first stack went up well. The bottom stone was slightly heart shaped and added an element of interest to the stack as it wasn’t quite conventional.
The second stack collapsed as it neared completion so I had to rebuild it. No real problem but it was still relatively insecure.
I took some photos of the two stacks as I wasn’t sure whether the second stack would survive while I built the third. The third stack presented some interesting stones and hence some interesting balances. Started to feel the chill and my daughter, Rhiannon was getting cold so we decided to give up when the third stack was complete.
As we decided to pack up and go a young couple came onto the beach and the chap had a camera with him. He decided to take some photos and we decided to leave. One of the nice aspects of Church Ope Cove is that as you leave the beach you can look back down on the beach. As we looked back we saw the same couple sitting by the stacks. The picture still in my mind is of two lovers finding an environment where speech is nit really required. The passing of feelings and emotions between people can take place by just knowing that the other is close.