Friday, July 15, 2011

Friday 15th July 2011: Slapton Sands and Dartmouth

After the hot day of our arrival the weather changed to cool and showery. We bought a map at admin and set off along the so called "A" 379, which would have been regarded as a "B" or "C" road in Yorkshire. That's not to say that it wasn't an interesting drive, as the road ran up hill and down dale and through some tiny villages that were so narrow that the 20mph speed limit made a lot of sense!
Early on in the journey I took a shot across Plymouth sound to give an idea of the sort of weather we were having.
Fortunately the weather did improve and after a surprisingly slow drive we arrived at Torpoint, the start of Slapton Sands, to see this Sherman tank recovered from the sea.
It is a memorial to the American GI's who were taking part in a mock invasion called "operation Tiger" (Because the shingle beach here is similar to Omaha Beach in France) unfortunately for them they were spotted by a german aircraft that called up E boats, resulting in the sinking of several ships with the loss of 947 American lives, one of the wars great tragedies.
The beach is amazing, composed of shingle and it encloses a lagoon called Slapton Ley that is several miles long. This is the village of Torpoint at the southern enad of the beach
And here is Patty looking north along the beach
We got as far as Dartmouth which looked really very interesting but couldn't get on the car park, but we did find a "Subway Sandwich" outfit opened up in a BP garage and really enjoyed our lunch there.
By the time we got back to camp the weather was a bit better, and this chap was studying the sound with binoculars.
And this is what had caught his eye, one of The Royal Navy helicopter attack ships (at least that's what I think it is) amusingly I heard a chap on a mobile phone describe it loudly as a "Battleship"

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