Since last Sept...

[Jimbo]

San Steph beach will have been around since the last Ice Age

Tony Cox has got pictures to prove it!

Sand acts like a fluid, so it washes around. Heavy storm surges from the north east will move the sand from the shore region down to the south and around the harbours.

The gentler action in the summer moves the sand towards the beach, and creates the "lagoon" with one or two sand-bars farther out. But a quick summer storm will shrink the beach.

Spurn Head, near where we live on the Humber, has come and gone for a very long time because of similar action.

The beach is a living and wonderful thing at Ag Stef. Without these tides and wind, life couldn't exist, and there wouldn't be any sand, no tavernas, and a severe lack of Mythos!

Yammas to the beach. :-)

[Rover]

So the beach is lower. QED

[loftyscot]

I'm not so sure Rover?

Every time I go into the sea it comes up to my waist. If the beach was lower would it not come up higher?

[Jimbo]

If I went into the sea with loftyscot and it was up to his waist, I'd drown.

Yes - sand at certain points will be lower. But it will be higher elsewhere. The sea can't destroy the sand - it's a billion dumper trucks shovelling it from here to there.

Nice description here:

http://www.marinebio.net/marinescience/03ecology/sbprocesses.htm

[Rover]

Loftyscot is correct. When he goes into the sea the sea level will rise. Hence the beach will seem to be lower. The more water displaced, the higher the level, as when we get into a bath.