Saturday 24 October
Today’s little Essex adventure took is down to the Heybridge Basin and our much anticipated walk to the causeway over to Osea Island.
Low tide was just after midday so we got there for about 11am. A walk along the sea wall and footpath is not far as the crow flies but is about 3km one way.
The sky was overcast and we were anticipating unsettled weather sweeping in from the west. I love it when you can plan a trip out in the open air, knowing that bad weather is rolling in. Sure enough when we got back in the car, rain drops started to pepper the windscreen.
There is no doubt that some places carry a presence that cannot be captured or substantiated. There is no scientific way of proving it. But Heybridge, Maldon and the Blackwater estuary has it. So does the Dengie Peninsula and the stretch of land up through Goldhanger, Tiptree and Aberton. The whole region oozes soul and spirit, some good and some bad, but all tantalising and attractive.
On the day when we hoped to be walking alongside the Adriatic (our planned trip to Italy cancelled due to the virus), we instead walked along the Blackwater and half way across the causeway to Osea Island. The Romans originally built it. Romantic imagination made a fragile connection in my mind; did a legionnaire from Puglia walk this path? Of course it is so unlikely, but not impossible, and as the atmosphere sweeps me away for split seconds, why not?
The Bald Birder 