Wonderful shot! And cool animation. I've seen that effect before. A lot of my photog buddies do similar effects. There is a web service that lets you do it, right, for some hefty subscription cost? It goes well with this photo.

If I lived close to the beach, I think I would be there just about every evening for sunset photos. I hear what you are saying—we don't want to forget how amazing something is and start taking it for granted. I guess the only way around that is to remind ourselves of how amazing it is every day. That's what I try to always do.