Flats on approach to Walton Backwaters

[miles from the sea]

Further to a recent spate of groundings on the flats to the south of the entrance channel I was sailing in on Monday just as the sandbank near to buoy 6 was emerging ( chart drying height 1.3m) and the sandbank to the south of the low water lagoon (drying height 1.5m) was showing by about 300mm. The tide height from the Harwich gauge was 1.2m at the time which suggests that the current chart data (I was using Navionics) is not far off the mark at least for the shallowest areas of the flats. Hope this helps but as with all east coast flats they are subject the change!

 

[johnalison]

My impression that that part hasn't changed a lot apart from the bank moving north a bit. I was out yesterday and turned south between 2 & 4 at near HW and there was plenty of water there, however, I am always very nervous about the shallows further in.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

In those waters, I would ignore the chart and follow the buoys. The buoys are relocated as and when necessary; the chart is updated every few years!

 

[johnalison]

In those waters, I would ignore the chart and follow the buoys. The buoys are relocated as and when necessary; the chart is updated every few years!

I’ve only come in in pitch darkness a couple of times and found it surprisingly difficult, even on my home ground and with a plotter. The odd lit buoys don’t seem to help very much.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

I’ve only come in in pitch darkness a couple of times and found it surprisingly difficult, even on my home ground and with a plotter. The odd lit buoys don’t seem to help very much.

I confess that I don't think I'm brave enough to try it on a really black night. Perhaps by moonlight, or a summer night when it never gets really dark, but otherwise I think I'd wait!

 

[Leighb]

I have never entered the Backwaters at night, but we did depart from Titchmarsh Marina for Ostend on a very dark night with heavy rain. Our fellow yacht was in the lead with a crew member at the bow with a big torch, buoy and yacht spotting and we followed as close astern as was safe. Didn't relax until were past Pye End, Sod's Law decreed that the rain stopped then!

 

[englishrobs]

About three years ago we came out of the Backwaters after a glorious evening into thick fog. Couldn't see the nav buoys until you were about a boat's length away. Not an experience I wish to repeat and made me realise the benefit of an autohelm and its far better ability to hold a compass course than me!

 

[Kukri]

I used to keep a boat at Walton… to my shame I managed to go aground and dry out trying to get in at night.

 

[johnalison]

As well as my one exit from Tollesbury in the dark which I often boast about, my biggest night alarm was when we had a club passage race from Osea to Suffolk. In those days the Bench Head was unlit and with a hearty following wind, pre-Decca, the buoy took on an almost mystical role on all the boats as we fumbled our way past the monster, with few of us seeing it.

 

[tillergirl]

You were right about 'monster'. This was it's unlit partner which I am sure was slightly smaller.

scan0007 by Roger Gaspar, on Flickr

We came back into the Blackwater at night and the Decca warbled its proximity to the Bench Head. I went to the bow and we never saw it ...... and never hit it.

 

[Kukri]

In the very early hours of Wednesday 6th September 1972, running up the Wallet at night in a tired old Dragon with girlfriend asleep in the cuddy and a Prout folding dinghy lashed flat on the counter, I had been steering for the Wallet No.4 and had shifted to steering for the Medusa, which I had just sighted, when the then-unlit wreck buoy inshore of No.4 , which I had forgotten about, flashed past the end of the boom, a huge black shape against the shore lights.

That was probably the closest that I have come to killing myself and crew in a boat.

I still shiver, thinking of it.

 

[AntarcticPilot]

As well as my one exit from Tollesbury in the dark which I often boast about, my biggest night alarm was when we had a club passage race from Osea to Suffolk. In those days the Bench Head was unlit and with a hearty following wind, pre-Decca, the buoy took on an almost mystical role on all the boats as we fumbled our way past the monster, with few of us seeing it.

I did fumble my way into Craobh Haven after dark, after an exhilarating and pretty much unplanned wild ride up the Sound of Jura! Spoilt it by ramming the pontoon because my reactions were too slow after a slightly seasick and much longer than anticipated passage.

 

[johnalison]

I did fumble my way into Craobh Haven after dark, after an exhilarating and pretty much unplanned wild ride up the Sound of Jura! Spoilt it by ramming the pontoon because my reactions were too slow after a slightly seasick and much longer than anticipated passage.

I’m afraid that that area is no more familiar to me than the Beagle Passage so I will give you the credit for an epic voyage. You are tight about tiredness though. My clumsiest entries into berths have always been at the end of a long passage. I was tied up in Brighton once and felt a bump from a small German boat clunking against my fenders into the next finger but thought no more about it. The next morning a young lady from the boat apologised and said that the skipper had just sailed from the Azores and hadn’t slept for three nights. Of the six boats that my late friend joined in convoy from Panama into the Pacific, three were lost, at least two from tiredness and bad decisions.