Exercise in Cropping - Reculver, Kent

A while ago, I posted a couple of images as an exercise in creative cropping. Well, I have decided to give it a go for myself. This image of the ruins at Reculver, Kent, UK, has several possibilities to my eye. Here goes...

Original Image: Perhaps too much uninteresting foreground? So, we'll start here...

Crop 1: trimmed off a bit of the rocks, still leaving a base for the photo and an overall similar structure, although slightly squarer.

Crop 2: Further trimming of the rocks, squaring the image and focussing now on the groynes, sea and ruins. May suffer from not having a base to sit on. I think it's stronger than the original, but not sure why.

Crop 3: Completely focus on the shapes of the sea and the groynes, with some small fishermen as interest top left. No sky. Completely different feel. I like this one.

Crop 4: The next logical step - all about the shape of the sea and groynes, and now it feels a little claustrophobic perhaps, so I tried to offset that with leaving perhaps more sea on the right than I would normally, to create space to imagine the sea extending further out.

I am sure there are more (like a vertical crop, focussing on the more abstract shape of the groynes), but I wanted to leave some for you guys...

Thoughts and comments welcomed.

Ivan