Thornwick Bay, near Flamborough…and the wild horses incident.

I had seen, in an auction catalogue, a painting by one of my favourite artists, Walter Goodin. He had links with Fred Elwell and thus Mary Elwell (my favourite Elwell), his painting was of Thornwick Bay. I did not consider it one of his best, but it reminded me about Thornwick Bay and I set off to paint. I can’t remember ever visiting the private car park and stopped to talk to the attendant. I told him it was my first time visiting and that I was intending to do a painting, and he told me it was one of the places that David Hockney visited a lot. This made me very interested as I love David‘s work. I paid my £2 for all day parking, and drove down passing the first parking area and stopping quite near the café at the end of the road. From here I could see this scene. I wasn’t sure about painting it  so I explored Little Thornwick Bay just behind the café. Though it looked interesting, I didn’t feel it was quite right so I returned to this view.before deciding. I sat on the edge of a drop down to the small Beech. The tide was coming in. The wind gusting from the sea made painting detail a little tricky and so I stopped before adding too much. I could add more detail I thought, at home but decided in the event not to. I suggested the buildings on the top of the head Land which usually I would’ve made more detailed. I would also have had more detail generally in the rocks and the grasses, but I’m going to leave it as it is. It keeps it honest while I was painting a woman came across and we chatted about painting, she was with a group of women and had travelled from West Yorkshire, I forget from where. I will return to Thornwick Bay and paint a few more of these arrangements, hopefully with less wind. I am  pleased with this painting as it reminds me of both Walter Goodin and David Hockney. I left the area and just popped down towards the end of the road at Thornwick Bay, paid for some parking in the shop car park £1.40 for an hour, and then walked down the ramp leading to the main bay. There are so many of these bays here. Down the ramp reveals an old life boat building which is now a café selling snacks and drinks. The beach was much busier than the one above, inflatable kayaks seemed to be popular. After a glance around I returned to the car. I had enough time left to visit Sledmere House.

Postscript -   As I drove through Bridlington on the way home, I saw a sign for Sledmere House and took the road. After a short while I noticed hazard warning lights on the road  ahead. I put mine on and approached cautiously. Then I saw the problem, three horses were loose on the road. They had ropes and chains attached, but these were loose. A woman had stopped her car and was trying to get them off the road without much success so I stopped and walked over. She explained she had a vulnerable person in her parked car and was anxious to get on but she didn’t want to leave the horses roaming on the road as they were likely to cause an accident. I got hold of one of the ropes and took a horse off the road and tied it to a tree. Then I got another larger horse and took that off the road and tied it to a tree. Unfortunately the tree was surrounded by brambles and lots of quite large branches on the floor. as I tied the horse up, it became a bit of a struggle. I then tried to walk away from the tree and tripped  over from (bramble) briar which managed to cut my leg and as I tripped, I fell on the ground and skinned and knee. Since my stroke, my left leg is a little bit unreliable so at this point I said to the lady, who had now been joined by another person that they could manage to last horse together which they did. So I drove off to Sledmere rather shaken. At Sledmere I quickly walked to the wall garden and produced a painting detailed in the previous post. What are ta-do?

Some of my art books - ideal presents, email me for details. All feature plein air painting oil on canvas board except Plein Air Landscapes and the Sketchbook which comprise panoramic sketches with watercolour wash.