Thames Island for sale near Shiplake

No thats the next one down, Hallsmead Ait is the bigger upstream one. It was famously found to have a Cannabis farm in the middle a few years back. Not sure what else you could do with it though as its completely inaccessible except by boat and it doesn't even have a mainland place to moor a boat or park a car, think you have to walk across the nearest field from the nearest lane.
 
Chris_d said:
No thats the next one down, Hallsmead Ait is the bigger upstream one. It was famously found to have a Cannabis farm in the middle a few years back. Not sure what else you could do with it though as its completely inaccessible except by boat and it doesn't even have a mainland place to moor a boat or park a car, think you have to walk across the nearest field from the nearest lane.
Click to expand...
What has kept it free of unlicensed live aboards? Aggressive security (probably a feature of cannabis farms) or?

The one I camped on near Richmond had a few drydocks, a slipway and a big drop forge on it. There were no unlicensed live aboards at that time but someone was cutting up an old timber ships lifeboat (probably for firewood) in the slipway, giving a "Man Friday" footprint feeling to my sneaking around, though I didn't see anyone.
 
Last edited:
The rowing club were telling people not to moor there on behalf of the owner. There is a lot of rubbish on the island. It Is fairly useless and the natives on the bankside are various and well established. No privacy that side and there will be generators so not quiet.
I live on the River and use my launch to come and go but that island is trouble. Remote site hard to manage. I would buy it then fence off the bottom corner and moor on the outside. Best spot for floods. Use the dark wooded bit for the chickens and firewood. Then sell the rest to someone else.
 
I think we used to moor there for the afternoons in the mid-late nineties, until it got overgrown and far less welcoming. There were two or three decent spots if I remember correctly.
 
First time I moored there was in 1994. Nice quiet spot nobody about but a lot of litter on the island.
Of course in the intervening 30 years things have changed and there is quite a large community of off-grid vessels some of which were previously occupying the island but were discharged during a police incident about three years ago.

So if anyone is thinking of buying it and expecting privacy they will be disappointed. It seems rather likely that any developments which may be initiated will be enforced against fairly rapidly by the local authority which I think is Berkshire.

I spake with people who I know and one of them suggested having a pack of large dogs while the other ones suggested installing a couple of Ukrainian families on Boats to deal with the management of private property rights in the rather remote zone.

Perhaps one could build a treehouse in the middle of the island in order to achieve a suitable social distance.

I do know a bit about managing remote sites accessible only by people on Boats. It is a fairly complicated task which most people may not fully understand how to deal with.

I would not touch this ait with a largepole but will be interested to see what happens.
 
Outinthedinghy said:
First time I moored there was in 1994. Nice quiet spot nobody about but a lot of litter on the island.
Of course in the intervening 30 years things have changed and there is quite a large community of off-grid vessels some of which were previously occupying the island but were discharged during a police incident about three years ago.

So if anyone is thinking of buying it and expecting privacy they will be disappointed. It seems rather likely that any developments which may be initiated will be enforced against fairly rapidly by the local authority which I think is Berkshire.

I spake with people who I know and one of them suggested having a pack of large dogs while the other ones suggested installing a couple of Ukrainian families on Boats to deal with the management of private property rights in the rather remote zone.

Perhaps one could build a treehouse in the middle of the island in order to achieve a suitable social distance.

I do know a bit about managing remote sites accessible only by people on Boats. It is a fairly complicated task which most people may not fully understand how to deal with.

I would not touch this ait with a largepole but will be interested to see what happens.
Click to expand...
Stilt house, Thai/Malay/Brunei stylee. Lack of large section bamboo is inconvenient though.

Stilt kennels for the dogs.
 
BB1 said:
Can't believe he paid 500k for it!
Click to expand...
It was part of the land ownership for Shiplake vicarage.

It comes up as £500k on LR and the vicarage was £6,8m. Maybe the island was deliberately over valued for tax reasons.

No way can it be worth £500k.


The other island (The Lynch) was bought by Shiplake college in 2010 for £100,000.
 
Last edited:
  • Like
Reactions: BB1
Outinthedinghy said:
It was part of the land ownership for Shiplake vicarage.

It comes up as £500k on LR and the vicarage was £6,8m. Maybe the island was deliberately over valued for tax reasons.

No way can it be worth £500k.


The other island (The Lynch) was bought by Shiplake college in 2010 for £100,000.
Click to expand...
Ahhhh, I see
 
It is quite an interesting problem area. The wooded section of land opposite hallsmead ait does belong to Shiplake vicarage however the parcel of land which forms what would originally have been the towing path does not belong to them. It is registered freehold land which must belong to somebody perhaps the Environment Agency given that they are the successors to the Thames Conservancy.
So there is now a situation where there are potentially belligerent occupiers of Boats between owned land parcel and the owned island. This probably goes a long way to explain why the Island is being sold. What can realistically be done with the island given there is no proper or particularly practical mainland access available?

Intriguing situation there.
 
The cartoonist at the Henley herald may have hit the nall on the head

island-cartoon-large.jpg
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top