Bears at the Beach

After our visit to Rosemoor, Polar and Grizzly drove us across north Devon to the coast road and into Cornwall.  Their little car went up and down some very steep hills, while we bears sat in our bear basket on the back seat, looking out at the views and singing happy small bear songs.

'I can see the sea!' cried Hanley excitedly, as we reached the top of one of the hills.  'Are we nearly at your friends' house?'

'Not yet, little bears,' said Grizzly.  'We still have quite a long way to go.  You could have a nap.'

We were far too interested in where we were going to sleep, so were wide awake when the little red car came down a long hill and very close to a wide sandy beach, then up the hill on the other side of the cove and down a little lane.  Polar put us in our bear bag and carried us up to meet Mrs Ann and Mr Derek, who gave us pats and cuddles, and tea and cake.  

From Polar and Grizzly's room, we could just about see the sea, but we could smell it and hear it very clearly.  We were almost too excited to go to sleep that night.

In the morning, we scrambled into our bear bag to be carried down to the beach.  There was a little path through some woods and lots of steps to go down before Polar was standing on the sand.

'The waves are quite big today,' she warned us, as she helped us out of our bag.  'I don't think you should try to paddle but you can watch the surfers, explore the rocks and caves and make a sandcastle if you like.'

Grizzly was going for a paddle, as he has poorly feet and the sea water is good for them.  Hanley Bear jumped about in front of him, asking to be carried out for a closer look at the waves.

'Come on then,' said Grizzly.

Hanley held on tight to Grizzly's hand as he was carried out into the waves.  He jumped onto Grizzly's shoulder when a bigger one came in that came right up to Grizzly's knees and got his trousers wet, but Hanley stayed dry and so did Endon and I, as we ran up the beach towards the cliffs, well away from the sea.  The damp sand was lovely to run on and the salty smell of the sea was very refreshing.

After doing some running, we climbed on some big rocks and examined some that had fallen out of the cliff, which Endon and I thought were partly made of gold.  Hanley Bear, who is interested in geology, came over to investigate.

'That's iron pyrites,' he explained knowledgably.  'There are all sorts of minerals in these rocks, because they have been heated up and put under lots of pressure in the past, when there were volcanoes here.'

Endon looked around nervously.  'I hope there are no volcanoes now,' he said.

'We could build one out of sand,' Hanley suggested.

'I would rather build a castle,' said Endon, who had seen some human cubs making one nearby.

We set to work, scraping the sand out of a circular trench with our paws and claws to make a moat, then moulding the sand from the moat into a wall.  

I asked the human cubs if we could borrow their bucket to make a tower and by the time our human friends were ready to leave the beach and go out for lunch, we had made a super small bear castle.

Hanley wanted to come back the next day to add extra towers and to fetch his City of Culture flag from the bear basket to fly from one of them.  Polar had to break the news gently to him that the rising tide would wash our castle away later in the day, and that his special flag was safer where it was.

'Can we make another castle tomorrow?' asked Endon.

'We will be having a different adventure tomorrow,' said Polar.  'You will still be by the sea and it will still be lots of fun.'

We all cheered and got back in our bag to be carried back to Mrs Ann and Mr Derek's house.  We wondered what our next adventure would be but we didn't ask, as that would spoil the surprise.