A Rare Sea Beach at Sonapur, Balasore in the Orissa State of India

I have seen sea beaches of different kinds but I got an opportunity to see a unique type of sea beach, which is one of its kind in whole of India. I understand that there are two beaches in the entire world which have some extra-ordinary characteristics - one is at California in USA and the other one is at Balasore in Orissa State of India.

Recently I got an opportunity to visit Balasore. Its sea beach is of rare kind. When I reached a place called Sonapur, which is some 15Kms away from Balasore railway station, I saw a different kind of beach. The sea beach was quite lengthy and wide and I could see that there was a vast and endless sea. I noticed that there were some moments in the farthest corner of the sea but near the sea shore the sea was nearly inactive. I could see waves coming from far end, but as they came near to the sea shore, their intensity, speed and movement decreased considerably. The waves like usual sea waves were not rising very high and coming down and waves were not dancing. The waves were very slow and calm and they were traveling very gently towards the sea shore. There height was not more than one and half feet. The specialty of the beach is that water touches the sea beach but after approximately every six hours cycle, it goes back some 5 Kilometers inside the sea. Then after six hours or so it again comes back and touches the sea-shore. I was told that this happen due to high tide and low tide activities.

When the water recedes, the dry sea shore looks as there was no water. A unique type of design gets formed on the dry sea surface like some snakes came and they left their marks. Sometimes the design looks like uneven wrinkles on a forehead. The soil also is of special type, it looks sticky and soft. It appears to have absorbed all the water. If you walk on the dry sea shore, you feel no difficulty in walking, it feels as you are walking on a plain land surface. Your feet does not dig deep into the clay type sand nor you get the feeling of walking on normal sand. There are in fact very less traces of sand, which is unusual and rare. Normally, I have seen sea beaches in India, which are full of sand. During my stay over there, I once visited sea beach in the evening. I observed that few people were around. Apparently, this place is not frequented by many tourists. I understand, it is being developed as a tourist place. I saw few groups of people going for their evening walk on the dry surface as there was no sign of water at that time on the sea shore. However, after 10-15 minutes, I realised to my astonishment that gentle but very low waves started coming towards the sea shore from the main sea area, waves were coming very slowly but steadily. I observed that the group of people who were enjoying their evening walk did not bother much about approaching water. Gentle waves approached them and slowly kissed their feet and some part of their shins and moved ahead towards the shore. Those people kept walking without any trace of tension on their foreheads. I realized perhaps they were used to this sort of routine. It was a new experience for me, therefore, I kept watching their reactions. Though it was a rare and new experience for me but like others I also kept walking on the dry surface of sea shore. It was really an awesome experience. I captured those beautiful moments in my digital camera. Meanwhile, the sun set and the evening turned into darkness. I was told that incoming and outgoing movement of water towards sea shore happens due to high and low tides in the sea.

Next day I went to see sun rise on the beach, because this beach is situated in the Eastern side of India and sun rises from the East. On reaching there, I found that weather was not very conducive, there were some light clouds and fog in the eastern side from where the sun rises in the morning. But to my good luck, they disappeared soon . I saw red and orange shape beautiful sun coming out of sea. It was gradually rising as it was struggling to come out of the surface. And once it was three fourth above the water it appeared to me as sun was sitting on the lap of sea. It started coming out of sea and it was saying bye to see with the remarks - 'see you in the evening.' It went upwards and its colour also started changing from orange to yellow one. It was enthralling to enjoy sun rise on the beach. Sun had started shining with its full glory and its rays on the sea were looking as some artist has spread gold on the sea water. I captured the beauty of the moment and walked slowly towards my guest house. All in all it was one of unique experiences to witness unusual and special kind of sea beach. And more enjoyable was to observe sun rise from the beach.