Ataraxia in Essex
Tuesday, July 10th, 2007 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tamaranthSaturday would have been my father's 81st birthday. Since it was a glorious day I decided to celebrate it and him by heading back to the Essex marshes.
I've spent many July 7ths on this particular bit of beach. It was odd sitting there watching the tide come in and being able to remember being there exactly 30 years before (7.7.77), in very nearly the same spot, with my parents.
Late-afternoon high tide meant that the water (coming in across the mudflats) was pleasantly warm: I swam twice. Watched some windsurfers. Noticed that one can see Grain Tower (= Shive Tor) quite clearly, even at high tide.
Then I drove up to Wallasea Island, through familiar territory I haven't seen for ~10 years (the last time I went that way was with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
lproven) and past the house I grew up in (still painted pink) and out over the marshes.
Wallasea is still half-marsh, wonderfully flat and bleak. I parked at the Creeksea Ferry Inn. It was the first time I've seen it open since the late 80s: it burnt down, was rebuilt parallel rather than perpendicular to the sea wall, and was closed for years as no one wanted to drive 8 miles from the nearest town, along roads that flood at high tide, for a pub; but is now open and thriving, with a nice-looking restaurant upstairs.
Walked east along the sea wall, looking at the half-laden ship (the MeДon) moored at Baltic Wharf, where my father used to be Crane Engineer; looking at boats on (and in) the river ...
There are a lot of wrecks around the Crouch. And, on Saturday, a lot of livelier boats: there was a blues band playing at one of the Burnham Yacht Clubs across the river, several barbeques at the Marina (not to mention the Wardroom, once a reasonable restaurant, now the Essex Marina Bar, Open to the Public) ... and, a fascinating reminder that demographically speaking this was not the Essex I grew up in, a clutch of Essex Youth swaggering along the sea wall and swigging Veuve Cliquot. We could only afford Lambrusco: but that was back in the 20th century.
Then the Good Bit. The Wallasea Breach. I hadn't been sure just where it was, and was pleased to find it about half a mile east of the marina. DEFRA have bulldozed sections of the old sea wall (in poor repair) and built a new one further inland. One hundred and fifteen hectares have been given back to the sea, though from the look of the mud flats it's going to take a while to recreate the salt-marsh environment.
A great deal of birdlife, and yummy samphire (basically salt water in a handy cellulose dispenser), and some very cracked mud. (More photos will appear on Flickr when I've found the card reader: forgot to take proper camera, these are all via phone.)
I took the landscape and the light for granted, all those years: and it wasn't easy living right on the edge of the map, civilisation-wise, without a phone or a paved road or a reliable bus service (late to college three days running because of exceptionally high tides). But oh, I miss it sometimes.
Back via the cranes at the Wharf ...
.. and home in My New Car, which is a pleasure to drive -- especially across the QE2 Bridge with IQ (80s prog rock, has lasted well, mostly unlike Genesis, perfect for the end of the expedition) on the stereo. (I'm amazed at how uplifting I still find an album that's all about dying, death and being dead.)
That day was the perfect antidote for a lot of things. The petty stresses of werk and mundanity: some worries, some fears: the lingering grief at my father's death.
ataraxia
I've spent many July 7ths on this particular bit of beach. It was odd sitting there watching the tide come in and being able to remember being there exactly 30 years before (7.7.77), in very nearly the same spot, with my parents.
Late-afternoon high tide meant that the water (coming in across the mudflats) was pleasantly warm: I swam twice. Watched some windsurfers. Noticed that one can see Grain Tower (= Shive Tor) quite clearly, even at high tide.
Then I drove up to Wallasea Island, through familiar territory I haven't seen for ~10 years (the last time I went that way was with
lproven) and past the house I grew up in (still painted pink) and out over the marshes.Wallasea is still half-marsh, wonderfully flat and bleak. I parked at the Creeksea Ferry Inn. It was the first time I've seen it open since the late 80s: it burnt down, was rebuilt parallel rather than perpendicular to the sea wall, and was closed for years as no one wanted to drive 8 miles from the nearest town, along roads that flood at high tide, for a pub; but is now open and thriving, with a nice-looking restaurant upstairs.
Walked east along the sea wall, looking at the half-laden ship (the MeДon) moored at Baltic Wharf, where my father used to be Crane Engineer; looking at boats on (and in) the river ...
There are a lot of wrecks around the Crouch. And, on Saturday, a lot of livelier boats: there was a blues band playing at one of the Burnham Yacht Clubs across the river, several barbeques at the Marina (not to mention the Wardroom, once a reasonable restaurant, now the Essex Marina Bar, Open to the Public) ... and, a fascinating reminder that demographically speaking this was not the Essex I grew up in, a clutch of Essex Youth swaggering along the sea wall and swigging Veuve Cliquot. We could only afford Lambrusco: but that was back in the 20th century.
Then the Good Bit. The Wallasea Breach. I hadn't been sure just where it was, and was pleased to find it about half a mile east of the marina. DEFRA have bulldozed sections of the old sea wall (in poor repair) and built a new one further inland. One hundred and fifteen hectares have been given back to the sea, though from the look of the mud flats it's going to take a while to recreate the salt-marsh environment.
A great deal of birdlife, and yummy samphire (basically salt water in a handy cellulose dispenser), and some very cracked mud. (More photos will appear on Flickr when I've found the card reader: forgot to take proper camera, these are all via phone.)
I took the landscape and the light for granted, all those years: and it wasn't easy living right on the edge of the map, civilisation-wise, without a phone or a paved road or a reliable bus service (late to college three days running because of exceptionally high tides). But oh, I miss it sometimes.
Back via the cranes at the Wharf ...
.. and home in My New Car, which is a pleasure to drive -- especially across the QE2 Bridge with IQ (80s prog rock, has lasted well, mostly unlike Genesis, perfect for the end of the expedition) on the stereo. (I'm amazed at how uplifting I still find an album that's all about dying, death and being dead.)
That day was the perfect antidote for a lot of things. The petty stresses of werk and mundanity: some worries, some fears: the lingering grief at my father's death.
ataraxia
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Date: Wednesday, July 11th, 2007 01:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Wednesday, July 11th, 2007 01:17 pm (UTC)Wardroom
Date: Monday, January 6th, 2014 03:04 pm (UTC)