Swimming in the Stour

[PaulRainbow]

Fancied a change of scenery yesterday so motored up the Stour and borrowed a buoy off Stone Point from a nice Mr Private

Sitting sanding some wood i looked over the transom and thought "those two buoys are a bit close together". Then i realised one looked like someone in the water, so i grabbed the bins for a closer look. Bugger, it is someone in the water. Couldn't see where he might have come from, but he didn't look to be in difficulty and he didn't appear to be clothed (from what i could see of him).

Was tempted to get on the radio, but as he didn't look in distress i decide to keep an eye on him. I watched him swim from the North Cardinal to shore, a fair distance as it was high water. When he emerged he was actually naked, he picked his gear up from the grass, dried and dressed and off he went.

 

[matthewriches]

You didn't have the binoculars on him did you?

 

[PaulRainbow]

You didn't have the binoculars on him did you?

I did until he came out of the water :ambivalence::disgust:

 

[Corribee Boy]

Often get swimmers around the moorings at Wrabness, and swimmers crossing the river aren't unusual: it took me about 40 minutes.

I've also seen swimmers going the length of the river, even in the main channel, towing some sort of marker buoy behind them.

 

[rudolph_hart]

We anchored off Erwarton last Monday and were concerned about the huge clumps of weed, some of which were as long as our 35' boat. They also extended deep below the surface. As we'd had a lovely swim in the Deben the day before (in the 'mere between Wadringfied & Methersgate.) with no trace of weed, we did wonder whether one of these Stour Seaweed Monsters could entangle a swimmer.

Raising the anchor took ages, as virtually the whole scope was 'weeded' & required hard work with a boathook. Again some of the clumps around the chain were 40 ft long (visible 6 feet aft of the transom. One of them promptly wrapped around our wing keel were we couldn't reach it & so accompanied us out of the river & finally slipped off at Walton Pier The Blackwater now has them as well but they're nowhere near as deep & the boat can cut through them.

 

[LittleSister]

I had a huge clump of weed come up up with the anchor at Copperas Bay recently, which took some hacking away. Fortunately not of those dimensions, and I didn't find any entangled swimmers in it!

 

[PaulRainbow]

Often get swimmers around the moorings at Wrabness, and swimmers crossing the river aren't unusual: it took me about 40 minutes.

I've also seen swimmers going the length of the river, even in the main channel, towing some sort of marker buoy behind them.

Never seen one before, so gave me a bit of a start.

 

[Corribee Boy]

I've got to agree with that - when I saw the first one going along the channel, i thought it was someone in distress being carried away by the tide.

Does anyone remember the confession in the back of Yachting Monthly some years ago, from a woman who decided to cool off by jumping off her boat at Wrabness, wearing swimmers improvised from underwear, and her consequent embarrassment on having to be pulled out by another boat well downstream as she'd misjudged the current.