Beside the Seaside
BEACH HOLIDAYS ARE THE BACKDROP TO MANY A WISTFUL CHILDHOOD MEMORY, BUT, AS TIM MOORE FINDS, NOSTALGIA AND PRIDE CAN TAKE A KNOCKING WHEN PARENTS HIT THE COAST WITH THEIR OFFSPRING ILLUSTRATION BY ELLY WALTON
Bucket, spade, kite, shoulder-mounted boules cannon… when I became a man, I put away childish things; but when I became a father, I had to get them out again and hoover off all the sand.
Few parents look forward to long days spent entirely on the beach and, though I’m one of those rare sand-fans who does, it’s a well-proven truth that my definition of a good beach holiday – silence, solitude and horizontal inactivity – does not overlap with my children’s. A heaving mass of blistered, shrieking humanity, overhung with the cloying vapours of seaweed, burnt sugar and tropical-fruit factor 40 – heaven to those south of that 18-30 divide, but, to those north, it’s like some Speedo-sponsored vision of a medieval hell.
The mere feel of sand between her toes is an act of parental martyrdom for my wife, a graduate of the cultural-betterment school of holidaymaking: she will tolerate an hour, but no more, on the beach, as the spoonful of sugar that helps our children (and me) ingest the bitter medicine of an afternoon tour around local cathedrals. She lays out her
towel with the enthusiasm of Queen Victoria pitching a tent at Glastonbury, then applies herself to embarrassing us into an early inspection of religious architecture. Her finest hour came as we queued at a burger van on Weston-Super-Mare beach and she blared out the immortal inquiry, “Excuse me, but what exactly is a chip butty?”
Yet, in my family, as in most, the big holiday decisions are generally made by whoever wears the armbands, so there’s little point in parents troubling themselves with why – oh why, oh why – they have again been coerced into a fortnight of granulated picnics and French cricket. Just lie back, put that book over your face and try to remember your youthful holiday self, running noisily about on the beach, hour after hour, day after day. Then try to forget how much nicer that beach was because your dad made more money than you.
The mere existence of the word ‘windbreak’ suggests the British coast isn’t cut out for a seaside holiday: if you can sit in a rockpool for more than five minutes without shivering, it’ll be because it’s full painful decades, those continentals play the game at a different level. The Latin Dad Olympics are focused on compact displays of astounding skill: keepy-uppy with those little beanbag things and close-quarter wooden-bat tennis. Really, just don’t even try. Far better, I find, to engage in open-plan sports – rounders works best – that are hopelessly ill-suited to the claustrophobic beach environment.
What fun to watch as my children dive and scamper through the crowded outfield, sending arcs of sand across a huddle of beanbag-juggling Daddy Ronaldos or laying waste to some thongs-for-all beach-volleyball pose-off. And, whomever they outrage or injure, whatever they shatter or despoil, the hair-ruffling indulgence that is the Latin response to youthful over-exuberance means they are unlikely to be returned to me by some furious, sand-faced father leading them by the ear.
Not so on domestic beaches, where the ambience is underscored with the aggression that accompanies any gathering of topless British men. My very worst moment as a beach dad was when my son, then seven, came wailing back across Morecambe Bay and I looked up to see a trio of Wayne Rooney-likes staring defiantly from the trampled remains of his sandcastle. “Well,
End at Polzeath last August – Grown Man, bowled Small Girl, 0 – encouraged me to specialise in a niche event. My own father couldn’t catch a gently lofted beachball from two paces, but always won beachwide approval for his half-scale sand replicas of rowing boats and racing cars. The next afternoon, I finally knocked together a decent knee-high pyramid, then turned around to see my children gathered in silent awe around some dad, busy with a stainless-steel trowel, putting the final touches to a life-sized sleeping unicorn.
As our footballers have learned over many of children and the toilet block is just too far away. But weather doesn’t seem to be a factor in the pre-teenage beach world. One afternoon in Cornwall last ‘summer’, my kids cheerfully carried on with their sand constructions as the moats filled with sleet.
Perhaps it’s the need to keep warm that transforms British beaches into hives of bustling paternal activity – and by bustling, I mean competitive; and by competitive, I mean personally humiliating. Ball sports, kite flying, Frisbee attack – it’s the Dad Olympics out there, played out not for the benefit of participating offspring, but for all and any surrounding fathers. The background sniggers that accompanied my eight-year-old daughter’s devastating underarm spell from the Ice Cream Van they won’t be doing that again in a hurry,” I nobly informed my son, having gone across and told them he has a contagious virus.
The French like their children seen but not heard, but, when it comes to my lot, a complete sensory boycott is very much the preferred option. A Moore child doesn’t need to say a word to betray their nationality on a French beach – freckles, a fistful of frites and an unstarched beach outfit do the job – but, when he or she does, it’ll be loud enough to incite a baguettes-at-dawn showdown. Particularly on the Cote d’Azur, where the beaches are packed with poseurs: it’s hard to carry off languid superiority when some sunburnt young giggler is tipping wet gravel on your designer sandals or you cop a lusty goal-line clearance smack in the mirrored Ray-Bans. Things are more bearable on France’s other coast, where the beaches are the size of Belgium and the winds sufficiently potent to disperse excess juvenile decibels. But the water’s no warmer than Weymouth and, when your last Sudoku anthology has been blown away, there’s very little to fill the parental-entertainment gap.
Most challenging of all family beaches are those on the Spanish costas, where the unhappiest North European holiday traits are concentrated: you went abroad to get away from it all and, now, here it all is, only redder and more irritable. The answer, I find, is to check our offspring into the on-beach Club del Kidz, then take refuge in the nearest air-conditioned space.
Kids’ clubs offer an escape from beach-holiday fatigue for parents who remember the two golden rules. One – don’t celebrate your new-found freedom by drinking at lunchtime: under a hot sun, regretful melancholy is never more than a San Miguel away. “Look, a kitten. The children would have loved that. The children, the children… oh, we don’t deserve to be parents.” Two – never tackle these feelings by going to see how your children are getting on.
Are they broadening their cultural and linguistic horizons, as you did in that Corsican club enfants in 1972? The silence suggests not: it’s too quiet. Then there’s a rustle and a poorly restrained snigger from the bougainvillea bushes by the wendy house and, a moment later, you’re down, breathing hard and blinking up at the palm-fringed, azure heavens. It’s a big ask, but, at this point, remind yourself a beach holiday is about letting your kids have fun – and, much as you might have hoped to find them learning the ping-pong scores in German or the words of La Marseillaise, neither can compete with blasting their father in the surf-shorts with high-pressure jets of water.
Travel writer Tim Moore’s new book I Believe in Yesterday (Random House) is out in October
DOING IT FOR THE KIDS
BEST FOR… ACTIVE KIDS
Iberostar Creta Panorama & Creta Mare, Rethymnon, Crete
From watersports to basketball, mini-golf to archery, this four-star resort will please even the most energetic children (and their parents who are in need of relaxation). There are three kids’ clubs (for ages four to seven, eight to 12 and 13 to 18), a separate children’s pool and playground.
BEST FOR… BEACH LOVERS
Papillon Belvil, Belek, Turkey
Everything is blissfully taken care of all in the one place here. For kids, there is a mini-club for four to 12-year-olds where activities are organised by the Animation Team. Before you can say beach, children’s buffets, kids’ swimming pools and stage shows, the holiday will be over.
BEST FOR… ENTERTAINMENT
Sirenis Seaview Country Club, Port d’es Torrent, Ibiza
Located a 10-minute walk from Port d’es Torrent beach and 2.5 miles from San Antonio, this Sunstar resort is known for its cracking entertainment. Think poolside shows during the day and discos for kids at night. There’s also a kids’ club, playroom and playground.
BOOK THESE HOTELS
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