A clean-up operation is under way after a seaside village became covered in sand blown off a beach in high winds.
Cars, gardens and roads in Walcott, Norfolk, were left concealed by the storm on Friday and Saturday.
People living there said they “could not believe it” and had “never seen it like this before”.
The council said a clean-up operation started immediately and the authority’s leader and coastal manager visited the village to speak to residents and assess damage to properties.
image copyrightAlison Cavanagh
Jay Durrant said he could not believe it when he woke up to “loads of sand” covering the car he had wanted to sell.
“I don’t think anyone will want to buy it now,” he said.
Mr Durrant said it will take a couple of days or a week “to get rid of the sand and mess”.
As a result, the “sandscaping” scheme was adopted by NNDC to protect the coast from erosion in the event of major storm surges in the future.
Caroline Stubbs, landlady at the Poacher’s Pocket, said the sand was “lesser of the two evils”.
“I think we would’ve been flooded if we didn’t have the sand but it’s just a big clear-up job,” she said.
But Colin Pealing was not convinced his property would have got flooded and instead was counting the cost of damage caused to his prized garden.
“It’s destroyed the soil, we will have to start again,” he said.
Elsewhere, Norfolk Wildlife Trust closed many of its sites due to the strong winds, including the nature reserves at Hickling Broad and Booton Common.
Wroxham was also affected by the weekend’s weather.
