Foretaste of Spring

2 Pleasant Row, Hastings Old Town

The weather has been stunning since Sunday.  Today we had lunch at the Jerwood Gallery's Café, which has an unrivalled view of the fishing boats on the beach.  People were eating out on the balcony, enjoying the sunshine.  When we returned, one of our neighbours in the cottage just behind us was doing the same in her small back garden.

There's still a nip in the air early in the morning, but that first hint of Spring is nonetheless welcome.  What it also does is bring in the trippers, like returning swallows.  Trippers to Hastings are not, on the whole, well-heeled glitterati coming here as if to their natural habitat.  Hastings is edgy, a sort of Hoxton-on-Sea, so the mix we get is Bohemia plus denizens of the Sarf London suburbs.  Bikers abound, as do families bringing their children down to the coast for a breath of sea air.  Parking is difficult, so queues of cars start to form around midday.  Come the evening, it all quietens down again: the Harley-Davidsons and the four-wheel-drives with their stickers saying "Baby on Board" have all rumbled back to Bromley and Orpington, leaving the locals to do some serious drinking in the pubs.

Of course we know that this sunshine is all a bit of a tease: that Spring is some way off.  But it's still encouraging to get a whiff of it.