The sadness of Britain’s seaside resorts

Now the exhilaration kicks in, the lightness of heart, a joyfulness surging along the warmed blood vessels and tingling extremities: every cell feels as if charged with new life. There has been a ritual, a sacrifice, an offering to the waves of flesh and pain, and in return, there is restoration, life given back.

Thus Madeleine Bunting describes the bliss, not of swimming, but of having just emerged from the icy British sea into which she is addicted to plunging in winter as well as summer. In this fizzing state, having pulled her clothes back on, she goes straight to the nearest steamy café for fish and chips and tea.

Tempted? I’m certainly not out of season (delicious though the fish and chips and tea sound). But I do like to read about the contemporary British seaside as experienced and described by this thoughtful, investigative writer who, post-swims, takes off her rose-tinted specs.