Yesterday’s late afternoon trip to the beach netted me these 3 iPhone photos:
- Shining sea with boat in the distance.
- Driftwood and dark clouds.
- View East from the beach track: dunes, houses, dark clouds. Our house is behind the closest dunes.




@pratik Yes they were pretty good dark clouds. We got a tny splash of rain though. Barely wetted the ground.

@dejus It's a lovely place to live. 😀 Unfortunately, since we moved here 3 years ago quite a few others have decided that too, bought properties and built or are building houses. Still gorgeous though.

I know that feeling. When we bought this house 5 or so years ago, we had no immediate neighbors, with just trees around our property. But a few years ago someone bought the property northeast of us, and built a small cottage very close to the boundary. Then about a year later, a builder bought the properties west & north of us, ripped out all the trees, and built two houses, one again fairly close to the boundary. Not super close to our house, since we have 5.3 acres, but it’s changed our view, and made it feel less private.

@dejus So disappointing when folks build close to a boundary without any specially good reason. It's a shame you lost that tree cover too. About 18 months ago a tiny forest was cut down southwest of us. We went from “It's possible there's a house behind those trees” to a house that's hugely visible on top of a hill.

@dejus I definitely know the feeling, we used to have forest (partially cut down) but know we have about 10 houses. The closest 25 m away 🙁

@jemostrom Yeah, it’s frustrating. In my case, those other properties are each about 12 acres, yet the houses were built pretty much as close to the boundary as legally allowed (which admittedly is about 40 feet in this rural location). We’ve planted lots of trees around the boundary to re-add some screening, but it’ll take years for them to grow enough to do any good.

@Munish West coast lower North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand. Specifically, Waikawa Beach near Levin and Ōtaki.