Boxing Day Beach Bums

Well, Christmas Day may not have brought is the blistering sunshine we'd hoped for, but today certainly made up for it. As the tabloids like to say when the temperature in Britain tops 80 degrees for more than two days in a row - 'Phew, What A Scorcher!' We were, perhaps, a little fuzzy-headed from the gluttony and alcohol abuse of the previous day, but were raring to go once we'd glanced outside at a blue and cloudless sky and realised that this was, most resolutely, beach weather!

So, we loaded towels, deck chairs (pilfered from the veranda), buckets, spades, a gallon of suncream and a handful of beers into the car and head off to find a nice beach somewhere (we're on a peninsula, remember, so you're never too far from the sea). But first we needed a picnic; it being Boxing Day we really should have been ramming the picked-over leftovers of the previous day's turkey between two slices of bread, but we'd gone traditional yesterday and needed something a little different today. We opted, instead, for a trip into Avalon where we bought some quiche, pastries, fruit and smoothies. Then we headed off in search of a beach.

We carried on along Avalon main street, which climbs up and over the spine of the peninsula, winding it's way up the wooded hillside past some pretty pricey looking real estate. Then, over the crest of the hill you're presented with stunning views of Pittwater (the calm, non-ocean side), dotted with yachts and motor boats and water-skiers. Driving down towards the water we found a beach-side car park at a place called Clareville, which looked pretty much what we were after. A long crescent of golden sand backed by a wide stretch of grass which seperated some even more expensive looking houses from the beach. It was pretty busy but we found ourselves a decent spot, set up our deck chairs and presented Tizer with her bucket and spade.

The vast majority of folk sharing the beach with us appeared to be local familes, and there was a really pleasant, sunny, 'British Bank Holiday' vibe to the place. I say 'British Bank Holiday' vibe - of course said vibe is based purely on distant, childhood memories of '70s beach holidays: the sun shining high in the sky, we'd play cricket on the beach, eat sandwiches with real sand in them (we didn't mind) and lap at fast-melting ice-cream cones with strawberry sauce and hundrends-and-thousands on top. Then we'd load ourselves into the car and drive home along free-flowing open roads, ultimately falling asleep on the back seat. If we were lucky, the next thing we'd know would be waking in our bed the following morning, our father having carried us in from the car without ever disturbing our slumber.

The cruel reality of Bank Holidays nowadays is, of course, starkly different where - on the off chance that it isn't sleeting - a trip to the beach involves dodging crowds of teenagers smashed on White Lightning, avoiding used condoms left partially buried in the sand and eating mystery meat products from condemnable fast-food stalls before spending the following three days stuck in a traffic jam, choking on the fumes of thousands of slowly overheating people carriers.

Thankfully, Clareville Beach was very much the model of my childhood holidays circa 1977. Children paddling in the sea, grandads snoozing on deck-chairs, picnics being picked at, sandcastles being built (then flattened). There was a compelling game of cricket in the offing which was steadily proving rather enthralling to watch. A family group of 12 or so were playing in the 'no team' tradtion of beach cricket whereby once the batsman's out he immediately becomes a fielder and one of the other fielders goes into bat in his place. One dad was acting as both captain and umpire, organising his fielders, deciding who came into bat next and passing final judgement on some pretty athletic appeals of 'Owzat?!?'. Sorry to go on, but it would never happen like this in England. We'd 'muck about', or cheat, or argue, or just get too damned drunk to play properly. This was proof postive that the Aussies take their cricket seriously and end up having a much better time for it. It probably also goes to explain why us Brits are so crap at sport by comparison.

I happily munched on my quiche, sipped my ice-cold beer, and thoroughly enjoyed the game. Some of them were very good, especially the younger lads - I swear I spotted a googly being bowled at one point. Mrs V and Tizer went for a paddle and left me in my deck-chair to soak up the sun, watch the cricket and generally wonder why everything is shit in Britain.

As the afternoon wore on the locals started to wander back to the beach houses behind us and spark up their barbecues, so we decided to pack up, head back to Avalon and do the same. Trekking back up the beach towards the car park, a deck-chair under each arm, the tightness of the day's sun, sand and sea on my forehead and the back of my neck, it struck me how much the whole experience took me back to the beach holidays we had in Cornwall when I was a kid. How come they can still maintain this care-free, family oriented lifestyle in Australia, whilst back home we're blighted with tracksuited, foul-mouthed chavs, cut-price Stella in plastic glasses, stereos pumping out distorted bass from the open windows of a pimped-up cars and an all pervading sense that something might 'kick-off' at any moment? It's all rather depressing when you think about it. So let's move on.

Back at the Beach Retreat, we showered, cracked open a bottle of white, swept up the day's cockroach carcasses and whacked some tucker on the barbie. Fair dinkum, if I didn't feel like a real Aussie! We flamed the steaks we'd picked up from the butchers in Avalon on Christmas Eve, along with a nice bit of pork and some corn. Mrs V - aware of her mysterious appeal to mosquitos - didn't want to eat outside, which seemed a shame, but we still had a slap-up meat-fest indoors with yet another outstanding bottle of local Shiraz. The evening was only really marred after Tizer was put to bed and I managed, once more, to play pool like a one-armed monkey, with Mrs V beating me back-to-back at another four or five games.

A splendid day, the likes of which you don't get all that many of in life. Tomorrow, we're going to visit a lighthouse and hangout with the guys from the Surf Club at Summer Bay.