The Gathering Tide: A Journey Around the Edgelands of Morecambe Bay

Lloyd's observations of her walks around Morcambe Bay, interspersed with local history, are some of the freshest and most eloquent descriptive writing I've read. Her images are perfect, instantly conjuring up a familiar experience or scene yet never feeling stale or contrived. Birds flying 'with such speed, like specks of paint flung from the end of a painter's brush' are an apt simile from an author who paints so vividly with her words that I actually feel like I have acompanied her on these walks.

An interesting and beautifully written book about walks, wildlife and scenery and history and people and geography around Morecambe Bay. Karen Lloyd weaves stories from her own childhood with the places she visits and people she meets, giving the book a feeling of honesty and grounding it as being from someone who knows Morecambe Bay well. She is interested in the small things and the details and has so much enthusiasm for the landscape, describing the sea and sands in the different lights, the water turning from slate grey to bright blue sometimes on the same day. Her parents had moved to Morecambe Bay and her mother never considered it the real sea but Karen Lloyd knows that is what it is but it is also a special and yet dangerous show more place of tides and quick sands. A must read for anyone who loves Morecambe Bay. I learnt so much from this book and I am sure I will read chapters of it again and again. show less

Mention of the name Morecambe and most people will think of the late great Eric Morecambe. But it is also a town on the west coast of England, and a huge bay. This 310sq km natural feature shot to fame back in 2004 after a number of Chinese cockle pickers drowned after the tide swept in. It is a treacherous place, full of shifting channels, quicksands and rivers that can change course by six, yes six miles within 24 hours. The quicksands have been known to swallow vans and tractors amongst other things and even today it still claims lives.

However, this deadly bay is also a place of rare beauty and a haven for wildlife and ironically one of the best ways to experience it is on foot around and across the bay. Crossing here by foot could show more be the last thing that you ever did if it wasn't for locals who know the sands like the back of their hands. The Queen's Guide to the Sands is a role that was created in 1548 and takes years of experience to learn the way that the sands shift every day. At the moment he has no successor and it is a knowledge that could be lost forever if no one steps up.

The Gathering Tide is Karen Lloyd's journey around and across this dynamic sea and landscape. Her evocative writing weaves together the physical journey on and around the sands, across the dunes and out to the islands and one kingdom, that poke their heads above the 10m tides. There are glimpses back into her past, fond memories of growing up in the area and meeting up with people whose livelihood depends on this coastline. A chance meeting with a friend that she hadn't seen for a long while opens the memories once again as they catch up with events that had happened in their lives. This is a thoroughly enjoyable read of a coastline whose beauty belies the deadly effect of the tides. show less

A great read about an unusual and liminal part of the world. I thought I knew the bay but there is so much more to know and Karen Lloyd tells it in beautiful prose.