Last weekend I went to Essex, not normally the most exciting of destinations, but it was well worth it. Along with a significant proportion of my Maternal family I was the guest of my Uncle Derek on a lightship moored in the salt marshes of Tollesbury. Many photos were taken which I intend to post up in batches. First up, the salt marshes themselves which were unlike anywhere else I’d been, despite being a 30 miles outside of London.
A vista of the salt marsh from the top of the lightship.
The mind doesn’t expect to see plants growing in salt walter, despite it being logically possible. Most of it was sea grass (I think) like this which tastes salty when bitten. Very odd.
This section was recently “reclaimed” for the marsh and flooded which killed the trees. A cousin-in-law John commented, it’s kinda eerie to see half the plants thriving on what’s killing the other half.
As seen in the first photo above, lots of inlets and rivers. During a normal tide these would fill up but on a very high tide they’d be covered.
The most striking thing about the place was how, at low tide, the boats looked like they’d been dumped in a muddy field. That’s the lightship in the distance.
Being a mooring area there were many odd wooden structures about the place, some in use, some abandoned. Since they were often covered in muddy water they exhibited a combination of decay and preservation.
Boats moored in mud.
Coming soon, photos of the lightship itself and some cheesy family stuff.