The temperature in the high teens was repeating a pattern which had continued for the last couple of weeks. Warm days, heat hazes, t-shirt and shorts, evening beers at the local social spot. Summertime was well and truly here and the sea stretched out in front of us as we wandered along stony beach killing time until our kayak trip kicked off.

Did I mention that we are still in early April?

As far as we were concerned the unseasonable warmth made this the perfect day to explore some of the sea caves around the Angus coast, whether it was spring or summer.

We’d arrived at Auchmithie a bit early to enjoy the sun and searched the beach for treasure, finding some sea glass and a cave at the north end of the beach. Gav took some rather cool pictures of rocks.

We had booked a tour through Arbroath Cliff Tours and Cammy, the guide, was fab. Enthusiastic, knowledgable and exuding that confidence that said everything would be ok, regardless of how much you accidentally tried to hurt yourself. We would also get to use the sauna after our trip and enjoy some time dipping in the north sea.

After what seemed like a 60 minute effort to get into a wetsuit, we were ready to paddle off on the incredibly calm sea.

Our first cave was The Brandy Cave. An old smugglers cave. With added puffin.

Our second cave was Gaylet Pot, a well known sea cave about 400ft long that I’d wanted to visit for a long time.

On the return journey to Auchmithie we went back through the Brandy Cave.

I was in a small boat on the big sea. But the sea was flat calm.

We returned to Auchmithie about two hours after we had left but could easily have stayed out at sea floating in what felt like Mediterranean conditions.

The post-kayak sauna and swim topped off what had been an amazing adventure.