Down by the Sea: The Plan

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“Turn towards the light”



Down by the Sea was, at the offset, among the easiest of the songs chosen to relate to a place. Its writer, David Ford, holds an annual charity Christmas bash near his hometown, which just happens to be down by the sea. All we needed to do was find out the date, buy a ticket and have a December seaside getaway full of milk, cookies and good music. Of course, nothing has quite gone to plan since around about the third song in on our trips, and so, almost as expected, David Ford decided not to put on his annual charity bash for the first time in ten years. Not deterred, I decided to take the song apart and find a place from the lyrics. Clearly, down by the sea is a good starting point, but there is a lot of sea around the country, one of the many benefits of living on an island. The only clear directions in the lyrics come from ‘turn towards the light’, and so I partnered this with the title and followed the light until we got to the sea. There is a good chance that if I’d have followed the streetlights we would never have made it out of the West Midlands, so sun seemed a more sensible light to follow, and logic seemed to suggest that we follow it where it disappears every night: due west.



Taking a map and setting a course west until we reach the sea takes us straight to Llangelynin in Wales. I’ve never heard of it before either, but it does have a church, a beach and a population of 708, what more could you ask for? Just in case it turns out that there isn’t enough to keep us occupied though, we won’t be far from Barmouth, the southern end of Snowdonia and (via a lengthy detour, admittedly) Borth, so we can choose between going on the fair, climbing a mountain or playing table football on a rotten pitch at Geoff’s amusements, should we feel the need.

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