Shore logs from the Maresme and Garraf coast, Catalonia
A sea that barely moves, and the pools it shows on a calm morning.
Calm-sea mornings on the Maresme and Garraf shores: anemones, urchins, winter drift and sea glass, looked at closely and left where they were found.
These are notes from early mornings on the rocky edges of the coast north and south of Barcelona, written to help me and anyone else read a sea with almost no tide, find what lives in its pools, and leave every stone the way it was.
Barcelonawalking these ledges since 2020
The finds tray
Each compartment is one log, newest at the top left. Nothing in the tray was taken from the shore.
- TC-04 · Sea glassSea glass on granite and limestone: frosting, colours and what staysWhy sea glass looks different on the Maresme sand and in the Garraf coves, what the colours tell you, how long frosting takes, and the rules I keep about taking it home.6 Jun 2026 · 8 min
- TC-03 · DriftAfter the east wind: what a winter storm leaves along the strandlineWalking the Maresme and Garraf the morning after an easterly storm: seagrass banks, fibre balls, cuttlebones, by-the-wind sailors, and the rubbish that arrives with them.24 Jan 2026 · 9 min
- TC-02 · IdentificationAnemones and urchins, and learning to look without lifting a stoneTelling the common anemones and the two urchins of the Catalan shallows apart by eye, and the habits that let me watch a pool for half an hour without disturbing it.5 Jul 2025 · 9 min
- TC-01 · ConditionsReading a sea with almost no tide: when the pools show themselvesWhy the moon matters less than the barometer on this coast, how wind and pressure lower the water by a hand's width, and how I choose which mornings to go out.15 Mar 2025 · 8 min
Go, or stay in bed
Set the alarm when
- Barometer high and holding for two days
- Wind off the land overnight, from north or north-west
- Waves forecast under half a metre on the coast
- The second calm morning, not the first
Stay home when
- Any east wind in the last two days
- Swell running onto the ledges, however blue the sky
- Summer mornings after nine, when the water clouds with sand
- Closed beaches after a storm, until the wind has turned
One morning, copied from the notebook
A settled spell in January, second calm day, on a granite point north of the city.
- 06:52
Coast train out of the city, still dark, flask and notebook in the bag.
- 07:41
First ledge. 1031 hPa, light north-westerly, water 13.5 °C, spoon visible at 60 cm.
- 07:48
Hands behind back for a full minute. Two beadlets open, a blenny under the rim.
- 08:30
Urchin count along the usual strip: black 14, purple 3.
- 09:15
Strandline walk back. Cuttlebone, fibre balls, one bag of line and bottle caps.