Next:
Looking back:
I am going to start at the Harwich end.
On the other two occasions I started at the Epping end, and I did not want to repeat that.
Actually I missed the real end of the trail. I have no desire to walk through Harwich. I know what an economically depressed town looks like. Its easy to conjure up images of trainers and baseball caps, fat fools in jogging pants and hard faced youth giving you "the stare". All very boring, I will leave them with the stink of territorial pissings in their nostrils.
So I started off a few kilometres from this point. As it is not a sea to sea route there is no real motivation to bother with the last bit, unless you are a stickler for "finishing".
So Ramsey is my start point. Its a small village where the pavement is barely a curbstone wide but soon all that is left behind and we are in fields.
A windmill is what catches the eye here. It retains its sail but they dont look to be functional. Its still good to see the old gentleman though, not so many left really. It reminded me somewhat of the Norfolk Broads where you do still see the shells of so many pump houses.
Across some fields and paddocks we go. I idly wonder if the owner did have to pile all that horse dung right by the stile. Given the answer is almost certainly no, it seemed a bit of a cheek.
Past a broken down barn, is it really the last remnant of the farm marked on the OS map? No other building is in evidence and the pond is now so weed choked you could miss it.
Past a broken down barn, is it really the last remnant of the farm marked on the OS map? No other building is in evidence and the pond is now so weed choked you could miss it.
It is clearly reaching the end of a long lifespan and nobody has cared enough to tend it for considerable time. Not wishing to dwell on such things I take the picture, hope it has more life in it than it would appear and move on.
There are a couple of wooded areas up ahead but despite there being perfectly adaquate footpaths through them the EW studiously avoids them, and so avoids walking through the woods. It prefers the coastal setting of the River Stour.
Thats fine, the trees are only a few yards away and the views across the Stour are really wonderful. Coastal erosion is a factor all along this stretch, its a fact of life in this area.
The EW is nicely signposted and easy to follow. There are more trees than the OS map leads one to believe, all fine by me.
Especially so this day as a couple of times the clouds unzipped and the water just fell out of the sky.
The modern EW trail sign is a Poppy, and there are certainly a good many of the real thing to be seen along the walk. The Poppy seems to have made something of a comeback in farmers fields over the last decade or more, a change in pesticides perhaps.
After 2 km or so of walking along the shoreline you turn inland, due in part because of coastal erosion and head to Wrabness .
This is not so much a place as a name on the map. Its certainly a village, but village "life" maybe not. Its a long time since I have been here, came by boat once, a lifetime ago.
Beside the church is a large barn of a building being held together by plastic sheeting by the look of it. A real mess. This is Wrabness Hall and it is the place you plant a tree in memory of a recently departed loved one. I presume this venture is linked with Remembrance Wood the EW skirts as it continues its way westward.
Strolling through the nature reserve nearby my memory was jogged as to a secondary purpose of this walk, butterflies.
One can do these walks in a mindset of tunnel vision, the destination being the only reason to begin. To snap myself out of this mindset a simple task.
To take a picture of as many different butterfly species as possible as I stroll along.
A good deal easier said than done, there are butterflies in profusion, but getting them to pose for the camera is no easy task at all.
It could be anything really just to make you aware of ones surroundings more, naturally while stalking butterfly you see a lot of other things you would normally charge by. It just adds another element to a walk.
Soon we are back on the coastal element. And by the look of things actually on a high tide mark of it. Although prolly a storm tide or the very least a spring tide. This is a place for bird watchers. I know nothing about birds, so strolled on wishing I knew more.
Turning back inland, the path was making its way towards the village of Bradfield, under the railway bridge we went and through a field of peas.
A field of peas is something of a novelty as far as I am concerned. Oil seedrape, barely, wheat, potato, beets, all common fair, peas are a little out of the ordinary. It made a pleasant change.
Bradfield attained, it was time to head back. Some 20km round trip will have been done, and its a fine start.
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