Goose Rocks Beach

Author's Comments

Goose Rocks does not perform. That is what I like about it. It is two miles of sand in a residential corner of Kennebunkport that most travelers drive past on their way to somewhere louder, and it asks very little of you. At high tide it is a pleasant beach. At low tide it becomes something else entirely. The water pulls back further than you would expect and leaves behind a wide field of wet sand and shallow pools, ribbed where the tide has worked it, holding the sky in pieces. September is when I prefer it. The summer permit pressure has eased, the light has started its autumn lean, and the marsh at the northern end where the Batson River comes in is going gold at the edges. Time your walk to the hour before sunset on a falling tide and the sandbars will mirror whatever the sky is doing. I tend to work wide here. The composition is horizontal almost by default - a long band of reflective sand, a thin line of dunes, a sky that takes up most of the frame. The pictures are quiet. They are not the kind of photographs that announce themselves. But on the right evening, with the right tide, there is a stillness in the reflections that is worth the drive up the coast and the small ritual of finding parking. Bring rubber boots if the temperature has dropped. The pools are colder than they look.

Gallery