'Proper' Beach Etiquette

[Difficile]

AIBU unreasonable here?

We've been at a beach since earlier this morning, set up our little beach shelter (for baby naps) and chairs a respectful distance from the next people to us.

The beach is busy, but very large, and there is plenty of space, albeit in a less favourable place (you'd have to move when the tide comes in).

Several very large families have since come to the beach and put themselves directly next to us, moving our things to do so, and also directly behind us even though all that is behind us is rocks. They've literally surrounded us on all sides.

It's left us feeling incredibly hemmed in, especially with them all speaking very very loudly and screaming/swearing.

Their children are also stealing our things and the parents are just ignoring them, and they're playing football right in front of us and keep kicking the ball into our tent.

AIBU to expect a bit of beach etiquette? That you leave a bit of space between you and the next family (especially when there is plenty or space!), you don't shout and scream, you don't play games that will disturb others when you could play it elsewhere, and you teach your kids not to nick stuff?

Exactly this

Just buy a couple of windbreaks for creating walls either side
Baby shelter at the top
Blanket on the middle
Reinforce the wind breaks with chairs, bags and cool box
Huge umbrella over the chairs, keep all your stuff inside the walls
Use a mallet -the windbreak won't move

I think you need to wait until your baby has a poo and change the nappy with a running commentary about its content and then leave it at the edge of your beach boundary .

No, they can’t. When there’s plenty of space, it’s just plain rude.

Ah, “sharing”. That magic word parents of entitled kids who want to take other people’s stuff use liberally.

If you are going to kick a ball back, make sure it is about as inaccurate as possible. Though there is the danger they will think you are a Manchester United player.

Of course they can. It might well be rude but they absolutely can set up where they like.
And, yeah I agree, it's not something I would tolerate from my DC, but it doesn't bother me when other kids "share" beach toys.

I remember doing this sort of weird shit when I was a child. I’m almost 60 now. Nothing new.

This would annoy me too ..some people are just dicks.
The wind break idea mentioned above is good idea!

Some parents turn up with more tents than Glastonbury and don't even start me on all the equipment and bags.

This is why we've always rented a beach hut.

What, forcing yourself on other people? Why?

I’ve seen dreadful families doing this to an extreme level where they have blocked off ENORMOUS areas of beach. I’ve been gobsmacked at how entitled some people are.

I didn't suggest doing that at all
Top Is width of baby shelter so a metre at best

Agreed. Even with babies the max we have taken is a picnic blanket, a bag with all the swimmers/drinks/snacks, and maybe a tiny pop up shelter if we were feeling fancy. A plastic bag for wet stuff, and one for rubbish. I always have sun tan lotion etc in my backpack.

On occasion a paddle board or some body boards.

Kids wear towelling hoodies with swimmers under.

When we're at home we tend to just got for a morning or afternoon anyway, avoid the worst of the crowds and the heat.

Well I'm older than you and I was brought up in a seaside town so spent a lot of time on the beach and it wasn't my experience.
I just think very few people give a damn about how they behave in any public space these days.

Spot on @ConflictofInterest 😂

We deliberately arrived early and set up our stuff because we have so much.

We also have a toddler and all of the gubbins that go with two children and two adults - insulated picnic box, chairs blankets, beach shelter, toys, pushchair, spare clothes, swim stuff... We have enough to make it difficult to trek across soft sand which is why we chose where we are.

I don't mind being a bit crowded, but we literally look like we belong to these families, they're so close to us.

There's a difference between sharing and playing with our children, and taking stuff to play with on their own and excluding our older child from the play, even though it's her stuff.

I'm not suggesting that people should set up right next to you btw, just that it is inevitable. Next time take less stuff (you don't need a pushchair on the beach for example) so you can get a better spot.

People are getting ruder and more inconsiderate. In the past few years I have had someone hit my head with a chair leg whilst I was laying down sunbathing as the decided the squeeze themselves in almost on top of me. People who have sat direct in front of us and put their massive windbreak right the way across our view, literally right up to the edge of our beach towels so not even any sand between us. Another time I walked for ages to find a wide empty stretch of beach and a family came and sat right next to us....beach towels touching ours and proceeded to shout, play music and throw balls over us. After loudly declaring "Are you fucking kidding?" We got up and moved away from them.....there was so much space it was mental. My pet hate is the people who think you are there to entertain their kids because they can't be arsed.

You chose to sit right at the entrance. You could have set up elsewhere

They shouldn't have moved your stuff but it sounds like you were taking up a lot of space inconveniently anyway

Oh and the tide comes in fast. If you're setting up for the day, you don't want to be where the sea can suddenly creep up on you

Ok so you are older than me. So maybe 79 years ago it was different. But 58 ago it was like this

Who rattled your cage?
You were the one who introduced age into things in the first place!
Obviously your experiences were different to mine.

They sound like dicks but...that's what you get when you set up camp by the entrance to the beach.

Even when we had small DC we made the effort to walk 5 minutes on, in order to get space and not be near the entrance hogging dicks. The further you get from the beach entrance, the less dickish the other beachgoers. That's just how it is.

If the children are playing on the rocks, there were limited spots available?

I think from the way op has described them, this will be their norm and they will feel very at home.

ive a husband who cannot abide swearing in public where children are present and there would have been a frank exchange of views.

We sat where we could given the combination of having lots of things and a toddler alongside the baby.

There are reasons why we need the pushchair for people saying we shouldn't bring it onto the beach.

We also haven't taken up loads of space, literally the width of the beach shelter with picnic blankets half inside and two chairs one in front, and one slightly to the side, of the beach shelter. Everything else is inside the beach shelter.

Also, the beach is massive! We could have taken up twice as much space and there's still enough space for everyone.

And am well aware of the tide, as should most people be who are coming to a beach. Where we are it will take hours for the tide to reach us, and even the less favourable locations would have hours at low tide before they needed to move.