River Beach

Out on the Bass Straight a strong southerly was blowing. It whipped the tops off the waves and vaporised them, tossing them out like bridal veils for an ocean of salty brides. Solitary ocean gulls surfed on the wind, continually on the look out for the next flash of briny-silver.

Closer to shore, the wind blew more softly. The sea breeze found its way through the heads of a river, and wound along banks that increasingly became edged with reeds. With the breeze came the scent of the sea. It twined around points and headlands, and arrived softly and pleasantly at a little pebbly beach, lined with paper bark trees and gravel clearings for cars.

A beach on a river is a particular place. When the tide is out it is more river than beach, home to pale creatures who nestle invisibly in the soft river mud or dart through the warm shallows. Reeds efficient at filtering salt are a haven for black swans, who bob amongst them and think themselves hidden when they draw their head under a tender wing. At high tide the swans reveal themselves and gather at the up-river end of the beach. Their presence there reminds you that the river-beach is closer in spirit to life further up-river where creatures have no notion of salty water.

But with each ebb and flow of the tide the push up-river of salt and the ocean means the river beach is always in a flux of mostly being river and yet not quite. Gulls soar and circle joyously over you as you sit on a striped beach towel enjoying the sun, and their cries create a link with the ocean. Invisible to your eyes are the tiny sea creatures who come in with the tide, stay a while and then depart with the outgoing tide. Do they, like us, enjoy the holiday-like interlude of a trip to the beach?

*

Daisy ran down the beach. Her Mum and her Mum's friends June and Deb carried the towels, baskets and their books.

“Aah, you can smell the sea today,” said Daisy’s Mum.

“I want to build a sand-castle to the sky,” said Daisy. “Then, I’m going to sit next to the water, and let the waves come and get me!”

“That sounds lovely Daisy,” said her Mum. “But first, come and get some sun-screen on.”

The water was far down the pebbly beach, exposing wilting sea lettuce and many holes made by crabs. The sand that far down the beach was not white, or even golden. It was mixed with river mud. “It’s as soft as pudding to walk on,” said Daisy’s Mum later when they walked along the beach.

June and Daisy ran down to the water to swim. June dived straight in. Daisy wanted to dive in too, but all she could manage was to wade in until the cold water reached her middle.

“Wha-hoo! Look at the frog Daisy!” called June, gall-umping through the water. Daisy laughed and forgot to be cold. She began gallumping with her. They played giant frogs. They played skimming dolphins and splashing whales. They played beautiful mermaids.

Daisy’s Mum, Kristi, watched them play while she looked at the river and breathed in the faint scent of the sea. Deb lay back on her towel with her book. “The tide is coming in I think,” Kristi remarked. The rising tide soon covered the green, weedy sand. Next, it covered up the wide brown river flats. “Oh, look the tide’s really coming in now,” she said to Deb, who laid down her book for a moment to look.

Soon, the tide had come in far enough for the black swans to bob in amongst the reeds, close to the end of the beach. “Don’t they look beautiful,” she sighed.

June flopped breathless and laughing on her beach mat. Daisy lay down right next to her. June told Daisy quiet stories about pelicans, frogs and whales. They watched seagulls diving for fish on the river.

Kristi sighed with happiness. “Oh, lovely day,” she said to no-one in particular.

Deb turned the pages of her book.

A march fly tried to bite Kristi’s legs. “Ow!” she said crossly. “I keep missing it,” and she slapped at her legs.

“I reckon,” said June, “that we ought to put our shoes on and go for a walk.”

“It’s trying me now,” said Deb. Slap!

“No,” said Daisy. “I’ve got a sore toe, and I want to go home.”

“I’ll piggy-back you then,” said June.

“No, I need to go home,” said Daisy. “- Oh, look at this beautiful stone. I know, let’s go pick up some beautiful, treasure-stones.”

“Okay, let’s go!” said June.

“Let’s all go,” said Kristi. And they walked along the beach, splashing through small, warm waves until the shadows lengthened, and the breeze coming from the ocean grew cool.

*

That night, when Daisy and her Mum and her Mum's friends had gone home, a silvery moon rose over the deserted river beach. A warm land breeze flowed back down the river, twisting and turning until it met the ocean. The black swan family bobbed amongst the reeds. They tucked their heads under their wings and settled for the night. The moon tucked itself in behind a bank of high dappled clouds, and the beach was bathed in shadow. It waited for the day.

But down where the sand was pudding-soft the gentle folding and unfolding of river waves was stirring up a party: ribbons and splashes of luminous effervescence prickled in the darkness as millions of tiny plankton danced along the waves and set off their tiny blue green lights. They had been born out at sea and pushed down the wide river with the incoming tide until they found themselves at the warm edges of the river beach. They celebrated all through night until, with the coming of the dawn, their tiny lights faded.

And all the next day, while other children played frogs, dolphins and mermaids amongst them, the tiny invisible plankton tumbled and sang in the rolling waves, enjoying their short beach holiday, and waiting for the turning of the tide that would take them home.