Yesterday we were at Eastbourne with friends going back to schooldays on a glorious early autumn day. It’s the jewel in the crown of England’s South Coast seaside resorts with elegant Edwardian hotels,

a golden pier

and a fine marina.

Favoured by Debussy (who completed his tone-poem ‘La Mer’ in the Grand Hotel there) and Elgar, Eastbourne’s hinterland has such breathtaking places as Birling gap, the Seven Sisters

and Pevensey Castle;

all framed by the idyllic landscape of the South Downs.

Often belittled by those more used to Caribbean islands or South Sea lagoons the English seaside holds places which have still the capacity to enchant wonderfully.