Finding Sheltered Reading Spots on Windy Beach Days

Read the Wind, Not Just the Weather

On the coast, wind speed tells you only half the story. A steady fifteen miles per hour blowing offshore can feel like nothing at all on a sheltered promenade, while the same speed blowing onshore will find every gap between buildings and turn a pleasant bench into a wind tunnel. Before you choose a spot, look at the direction and the tide as well as the numbers. The Met Office forecast gives a rough direction, but a quick look at which way the marram grass is bending on arrival will tell you more than any app.

Timing matters hugely too. In summer, sea breezes often build through the late morning and peak in the early afternoon, then ease towards evening. If you can, read early or late. An hour after sunrise, the beach is often glassy and the dunes are warm; by two o'clock the same spot may be sandblasted. Pair that with a tide table and you have a reliable plan: a falling tide opens up the lower beach but also exposes you, while a rising tide pushes you back towards the dunes and walls that offer the best shelter.

Dunes and the Gentle Art of the Dune Slack

Sand dunes are nature's windbreak, and they are remarkably effective if you use them properly. Rather than perching on the exposed crest of the first ridge, drop into a hollow just behind the second or third line of dunes — these dips, sometimes called dune slacks, can be five degrees warmer than the open beach and almost entirely still. The trick is to sit low, with a ridge at least a metre high between you and the windward side.

A few practicalities. Dunes are fragile, so stick to established paths and worn patches rather than carving new routes through marram grass; the roots hold the whole system together. Take a sit mat or a folded towel, because dry sand shifts underfoot and a low folding chair will sink. Avoid the deepest slacks after rain, when they can be unexpectedly boggy, and keep in mind that damp hollows attract midges at dusk. Also check for soft, undercut sand faces if you are near the edges — they can slump without warning.

Promenade Shelters: Free, Dry and Facing the Wrong Way Half the Time

Victorian and Edwardian seaside towns left us a wonderful legacy of free shelters: glazed screens, curved benches, tiled roofs and cast-iron columns. The catch is that many were designed to shelter people from an onshore wind while facing the sea, which means they become wind tunnels when the breeze runs along the promenade instead. Before you settle, make a circuit and find one with a solid end wall on the windward side and an opening that faces downwind.

• Check the orientation: a shelter open to the east is bliss in a westerly and hopeless in an easterly.
• Look for glazed end panels: they block far more than open railings.
• Avoid corners: wind accelerates around building edges, so a bench set two metres back from a corner is usually calmer than one right beside it.
• Bandstands and colonnades work on the same principle — solid wall to windward, open view to leeward.

Bus shelters are a last resort, and only if you are certain no one is waiting. Seafront cafés with an outside wall and a row of benches often provide the best of both worlds: shelter, a hot drink, and a view you can enjoy without holding onto your hat.

Harbour Walls, Breakwaters and the Leeward Side

Stone harbour walls store heat beautifully and cut the wind completely on one side. The skill is working out which side that is. Walk the length of the wall and feel it — you will usually find a calm strip on the inner, harbour-facing side with the masts and the water still in view. Concrete benches, bollards and steps give you somewhere to sit, and the sun-warmed stone makes a cold day feel generous.

Do be sensible. Never settle on the outer arm of a breakwater in any swell, and stay well back from the edge when waves are overtopping. Working harbours are busy places, so keep clear of slipways where boats launch, and watch your footing on tidal walls, which can be slippery with weed and mud. If the harbour dries out, you will get a wonderful view of moored boats leaning on the mud — just mind the drop.

Groynes, Slipways and Other Small Refuges

Wooden groynes running out to sea provide a surprising amount of shelter from a longshore wind. Sit at the base on the downwind side, where the timbers have already done the hard work. Rock armour sea defences are less comfortable, but the boulders warm up in the sun and their irregular shapes break up gusts; do not climb on them, though, as they shift and trap ankles. Slipways, sea walls and the leeward side of a beach hut all work in a pinch.

Kit and Technique for a Blustery Page-Turner

Reading in wind is a skill, and a little kit makes it far more enjoyable. Take a paperback rather than a heavy hardback — lighter pages behave better in gusts — and weight the open spread with a phone, a flask or a smooth stone. A sit mat, a small cushion and fingerless gloves will keep you comfortable for far longer than you expect, and a cloth bag protects the spine from sand, which is the quiet destroyer of seaside libraries.

Angle the book into the wind rather than fighting it, and let a gust pass before turning the page. Windy days suit essays, poetry and short stories far better than a seven-hundred-page novel, because you will be interrupted. And keep a flask of something hot within reach — the sea air is deceptive, and the pleasure of a good chapter, a warm cup and a view that costs nothing is one of the great free luxuries of the British coast.