Thursday 16 June. Wrabness to Pyefleet creek ( Brightlingsea ) 22 nm

Another early start but a beautiful peaceful sunny morning up a river. So very different. We mooched our way down towards Harwich under motor and saw a great big stenaline ferry being loaded with container lorry’s . In the same dock was another stena line ferry much more obviously for passengers and cars. Off to somewhere in Europe. They are huge, I’m pleased they didn’t start moving whilst we were nearby. A perfect day for sailing except no wind. I have to admit after all the wind we’ve battled through, it’s quite nice! Apart from the engine noise. The sea was calm and smooth. The water shallow and brown. A strange visual phenomenon ….. that when looking ahead to the horizon, there practically wasn’t one. The sea and sky just merged seamlessly. It made the navigation marks easy to spot as they sit dark on the pale surface of the sea. Every so often we heard blasting noises … almost like a distant canon. It may have been my imagination but I thought it actually made the boat shudder. Several blasts and then quiet again. We heard it throughout the day 4 or 5 times. Any ideas anyone? What that might be? Our trip today was taking us out of the Harwich estuary and south to the Colne river and Brightlingsea. I once as a teenager went on an ocean youth club boat from here. My first big boat experience. We went across the North Sea to Oostend. On our return we landed on a sand bank and had to wait until the the tide came back to get off. Knowing nothing else, I though this completely normal! It is incredibly shallow around here. You could anchor just about anywhere! The wind picked up a tiny bit and we drifted towards our destination under headsail following the navigation buoys and keeping away from the sandbanks. Brightlingsea is a busy harbour and we had decided that an anchorage would be preferable. Apparently Pyefleet creek is a favourite amongst east coast sailors . We had read that there were moorings available run by the local oyster firm….. and indeed there were! Big orange balls with very short spliced nylon strops on top and a short yellow pick up bouy. Very different from the Scottish version! Anyway Sue and I managed to pick it up and secure lines on it using the yellow mooring tool. All was well. I even managed to pay for it by ringing the number on the board nailed to a post in the water. The Colchester Oyster fishery… Pyefleet Pure Oysters. Thinking that Julian would love some of those , we prepared the dinghy. Blew it up, got it it the water, etc etc. Meanwhile the tide had turned and started going out, the wind got up to 15 knots up our tail and we gave up the idea of dinghying across to fetch our oysters due to ridiculous waves which set up into our stern making it practically impossible and certainly not much fun just for half a dozen oysters! Sorry Julian! A slightly nervous evening ensued as the tide seemed to disappear very quickly. J had done all the calculations so we’re expecting to sit on the soft mud but we weren’t expecting to be tossed around whilst doing it! we came to rest pointing in a different direction to all the other boats . And we’re now in a sort of muddy pond! The depth gauge went to 1.3 which as we draw 1.9 m means we are 60 cm in the mud. But at least the wind died down and Angelique settled comfortably on her bottom. Chicken surprise for supper thanks to J, and a peaceful night.

What I learned today…… all about Pyefleet Pure Oysters and the method they use to make sure their oysters are free from norovirus and won’t make the consumer ill. So interesting!!

Sue x