Lens-Artists Challenge #364: Quiet Moment

Lens-Artists Challenge #364: Quiet Moment

This week it's Ritva's turn to host the Challenge, and her theme is 'Quiet Moment' (https://sillarit.com/2025/09/06/lens-artists-challenge-364-quiet-moment/). 'Where is your serene sanctuary?' Asks, Ritva. 'This week’s challenge is [a] “story-driven” adventure, encouraging you to explore and connect with your own experiences and emotions – “quiet moment”'.

Our holiday is over now, and we're back to the 'hustle and bustle' of life up north. Of course,  living in the countryside, on the outskirts of a small town, is nothing like living in the city, but compared to our routine for the last five weeks life feels ... faster.

Down in Meco, apart from perhaps seven days that we lost due to the weather, heavy seas, or a bit of a chill that I picked up from getting wet on a windy day, our routine was to wake up late, have breakfast, prepare food for the day and then take the roughly 1km walk to the beach. After setting up our little 'compound' (as we called it), we would spend the next several hours on the beach.

Around 7pm, we would pack everything away, dispose of our rubbish in the bins provided, and walk back to our accommodation. It's important to take all of your rubbish with you. We appreciate tgat the beach is for everyone and it deserves to be loked after. 'Leave behind nothing but footprints' is a good philosophy to follow, and even on tge beach footprints are temporaty. After a shower (and a beer), at 9pm we would head out for a late dinner, a digestivo in the local bar, and after a short walk to settle our stomachs, head to bed. Then we would wake up the next morning and repeat the experience. 

Even on those few days that we could not go to our beach, we went to the nearby beaches, or to the cliff behind our beach, to watch the sea (or the paragliders). Near the end of our holiday, the sea was a little rough because of a swell from Storm Erin, but we still managed to get out to the local beaches to view the waves, which were quite spectacular.

During our walk through the woods, all we can hear are the occasional bird and the wind in the trees. On a quiet day, when the sea was still, it was difficult even to hear the waves. On the beach, I spent much of this time in the shade of the umbrella and our tent, with the sound of the waves lulling me into a peaceful sleep. It's all over now, we're back up north, but we're already looking forward to doing it all again next year.

Themes for the Lens-Artists Challenge are posted each Saturday at 12:00 noon EST (which is 4pm, GMT) and anyone who wants to take part can post their images during the week. If you want to know more about the Challenge, details can be found here (https://photobyjohnbo.com/about-lens-artists/), and entries can be found on the WordPress reader using the tag 'Lens-Artists'.

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