Waverley! (2007)

Sort of Essex but not really. On board the paddle steamer PS Waverley, sailing from Southend Pier to Clacton Pier; onto Harwich Halfpenny Pier; then into Suffolk and along the Orwell River to Ipswich, the county town of Suffolk; turn in the port and return to Harwich.

PS Waverley was built in Lanarkshire. The voices you hear are, I think, Lanarkshire and Ayrshire. Although the journey is off the Essex coast, it’s not actually in Essex.

Clip 1: Underway, ’round about Shoeburyness I think. You can hear the beat of the paddles, and the whooshing noise is an air pump in the engine room.

Clip 2 (00:22): The approaches to the Thames are channels between sandbanks. To get to Clacton you have to cross a bank. Fortunately there is a gap called The Spitway that takes you from The Swin to The Wallet and the inshore route to Clacton. The Spitway is shallow, so you have to proceed slowly through it; you may even have to time your arrival for sufficient water. You can hear the slower beat of the paddles and the announcement of the approach, which is at right angles to Clacton.

Clip 3 (00:54): Slow steaming for the arrival at Clacton Pier.

Clip 4 (02:00): Alongside Clacton Pier, where there is often quite a swell. The telegraphs ring, and Waverley gets underway for the run up the Essex Coast, past Holland-on-Sea, Frinton, Walton, The Naze, Dovercourt, through the Medusa Channel, into Harwich Haven and onto Harwich itself.

The image was taken on board the Waverley shortly after leaving Southend pier, 2014. Image used under Creative Commons (Attribution-ShareAlike) licence. View the original image here.