Last April, when Charlotte and I celebrated our ninth anniversary together under the recently imposed and freshly terrifying first lockdown in the U.K., we promised ourselves we’d make our 10th extra special. While sat around our kitchen table by candlelight, drinking Gueuze from Champagne flutes, we dreamed of going abroad and staying in a nice hotel, doing romantic, anniversary-appropriate things like exploring a new city, and drinking wine somewhere with a view. That was, of course, before the second, and then the third, lockdown of this ongoing pandemic—and before the puppy we decided to get just a few days after that evening—rendered all of that impossible. As with so many things, in the light of the coronavirus, compromise was inevitable.
It was good timing, then, that campsites in the U.K. reopened a week after our anniversary this year. We eagerly booked a pitch at a campsite in Norfolk, East Anglia, as soon as the reopening announcement was made, and dreamed of long walks on the beach, and visiting our friends at Duration Brewing. It would be luxurious to get out of London, even just for a weekend, to stand by the sea and walk through fern-filled forests. Sure, it wouldn’t be as overtly romantic as Rome, or Paris, or a quaint little town with cobbled streets, but in comparison to the months of lockdown monotony, it would be bliss.
And so walking along the beach, watching Teddy confront dried seaweed and explore the mudflats, sure felt romantic. Even when one of us fell into the mud (I won’t say who) and I slowed us down a little too much by birdwatching keenly (I saw my first sand martins, redshanks, and shelducks, if you were wondering), it was beautiful. When we sat outside the pub that evening, drinking pints and chatting with our friends, it was easy to feel a little more normal once more.
When Charlotte and I got engaged the following evening, on a completely empty beach under an enormous, wispy blue sky, not even Rome, or Paris, or that quaint cobbled town could have bested where we were. As Teddy gleefully rolled in the sand before us (I like to think he was celebrating), it became clear that this trip wasn’t a compromise, despite the cold and our rather cramped accommodation. Instead, in a time of immense disruption and difficulty, it was everything we could have hoped for.
Words + PhotoLily Waite