The English Channel is the busiest waterway in the world. Ferries steam back & forth, trains thunder through the tunnel. The narrow sea has been crucial to our development & prosperity. It helps define our notion of Englishness, as an island people, a nation of seafarers. It is also our nearest, dearest playground where people have sought sun, sin & bracing breezes. Tom Fort takes us on a fascinating, discursive journey from east to west, to find out what this stretch of water means to us & what is so special about the English seaside, that edge between land & seawater. He dips his toe into Sandgate`s waters, takes the air in Hastings & Bexhill, chews whelks in Brighton, builds a sandcastle in Sandbanks, sunbathes in sunny Sidmouth, catches prawns off the slipway at Salcombe & hunts a shark off Looe. Stories of smugglers & shipwreck robbers, of beachcombers & samphire gatherers, gold diggers & fossil hunters abound.