It depends on what beach you go to. Some are rocky outcroppings, some are sand, some are just sort of the land truncating at the water and some are stamp sand dumped from the old copper mines. You sound like your from the New England area?
Wrong coast, I'm from Seattle actually, from what I have heard we have milder weather on this coast.
Ah! Right latitude, wrong longitude. I've heard Seattle is nice, but Washington is one of the few states I haven't visited.
I couldn't imagine living anywhere else, I love it here in Seattle.... though the other side of Washington is essentially a different state, if you go east of the cascade mountains the culture and climate is almost southern, it can be quite weird
It's the same with Michigan. There's a big difference between us Yoopers, the farmers downstate and people from Detroit.
I heard someone theorizing that they should split Washington and Oregon along the mountains instead of along the columbia river like it is now, that way one would be a long skinny state along the coast and the other would be east of the mountains and the interests would line up quite a bit better.