Swanage Bay is famous for its beautiful sandy beach but now pebbles have started to pop up everywhere and for once, it’s nothing to do with easterly winds!
Back in March 2020 and the beginning of the coronavirus crisis in the UK, a few brightly painted pebbles appeared along the beach for local residents to discover and cheer them up, while taking their daily exercise.
One of the first to be found on the seafront was this one bearing the message of hope.
Since then, the craze has taken off across town and lots of people, young, old and in between, have started to paint the pebbles with rainbows and messages of support for the NHS and key workers.
This amazing and growing collection can be found near the Mowlem.
There’s also an extremely artistic display to be found at Peveril Point, mainly created by the Swanage-based community group, Allsort’d, that supports young adults with learning disabilities.
This beautiful pebble rainbow (below) was created by Bradley and Liam, with a bit of help from their mum, Gemma Goodeve. Gemma said:
“The boys washed all the stones and then painted them all. Then they helped me take them back to the beach, bless them!”
Plenty more are to be discovered in Swanage, while people undertake their essential tasks around town. Of course, the idea is to send a message of support to all those in the front line fighting coronavirus, to cheer people up and to entertain, so always maintain social distancing while enjoying the displays.
If you have created some of the colourful pebbles or spotted some while out exercising, please post a photo in the comments below, so those who are self-isolating can enjoy them too!
