Weekenders
Throughout the summer, tens of thousands of people flock to Bournemouth at the weekends.
No longer merely a quiet place to retire, Bournemouth has in the last ten years become a focus for partying. After the UK relaxed it’s licensing laws a few months ago, Bournemouth was the only town in the country to approve every single late license application made by its numerous bars and clubs. On Friday and Saturday nights throughout the summer, the excesses go on until the small hours – it can be fun. Sometimes it turns ugly.
Sometime around daybreak, there’s always a few revellers left milling around the kebab shops and taxi ranks in town. Some of them don’t have a hotel room. Some of them just don’t want to go to bed. Slowly however, they all gravitate towards the beach – the 7miles of sand that is the backbone of the towns economy, and in the early hours of the morning, a surreal place where the repetitive waves and strengthening sun dulls any aggression or euphoria from the previous night.
During the summers of 2006 and 2007, I made repeat visits to the Bournemouth seafront early on Saturday and Sunday mornings, to find the dreamlike quietness punctuated by a scattering of survivors from the night before.
Asleep, 6.4am, Bournemouth Pier.
Andrea, 18, from Hungary. 6.28am.
Lane, 27, from Wiltshire. 6.42am.
Steve, 26, from Wiltshire. Morning after his stag night. 6.44am.
Asleep, near West Undercliff Promenade, 6.13am.
Jamie, 17, from Brockenhurst. 5.57am.
Dawn, 15, from Basingstoke. 7.5am.
Josh, 17, from Ringwood. 6.34am.
Asleep, Undercliff Drive. 5.47am.
Szusana, 21, from Slovakia. 6.49am.
Craig, 19, from Pontefract. 6.37am.
Anthony, 19, from Southampton. 6.51am
Asleep, near Bournemouth Pier. 6.17am.
Vodka and Coke, near Bournemouth Pier. 6.53am.
Kev, 28, from Liverpool. 6.46am.
Rick, 29, from Portsmouth. 6.51am.
Kirk, 24, from Shepherds Bush. 7.12am.