Heybridge Basin

Heybridge Basin

Gaffers

The 'Black Rose'

Looking over the sea wall to the Blackwater

Tidal Lock

Heybridge Basin is always a fascinating place for me, because of the different yachts that turn up there, especially during the height of the season. There’s usually a good showing of East Coast gaffers that attract my attention. Somehow, I never see the ‘plastic’ production yachts with their white hulls and high topsides. The old wooden boats are the ones with character; they have evolved over time: the shapes of their hulls, their spars and sails, all suited to the work required of them in years gone by, perhaps for trawling, shell fishing or the transportation of cargo, as with the spritsail Thames barges.


I’m leaving you here with a few photos taken by me at Heybridge Basin last Sunday. From them you can get an idea of what I’m on about, but you just have to go there yourself -sample the air, feel the breeze on your face, sit at a waterside table outside the Old Ship Inn, as you down your favourite beverage and munch away at a Ploughman’s Lunch. Relax in the glow of the warming sun; let your eyes delight in the tangle of rigging, the pattern of masts, glistening varnish, colourful paint and wriggling images reflected from ruffled water.



Links


Heybridge Basin

http://www.itsaboutmaldon.co.uk/basin/

Sunny Heybridge Basin

http://www.seylec.com/id6.html

The Old Ship Inn

http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/19/19840/Old_Ship_Inn/Heybridge_Basin

My Previous Blog – Heybridge Basin

http://bills-log.blogspot.com/2010/04/heybridge-basin.html