Monday 20 May 2019

Crossing the Wash from Wisbech to Boston

Yes, we've done it!  On Saturday (18th May) we crossed the Wash from Wisbech to Boston.  Out to sea and out of sight of land (well it was a murky day).  We were accompanied by Daryl Hill as pilot.  We thoroughly recommend using Daryl.  His fund of knowledge and experience gave us great confidence in the enterprise.

At the end of our last posting, Leo was on the floating pontoon below Dog in a Doublet Lock and the first challenge was to get ourselves to Wisbech.  We left at around 9.30 on Friday, about half an hour after high tide.
It has to be said that the tidal River Nene is not that exciting or scenic.  It was mostly pretty straight with high banks so that a herd of cows was a cause for celebration, especially as they seemed frightened of the boat and we herded them along the bank.  This picture shows the only bridge on the 15 mile trip, at Guyhirn.  This is just after the channel called Morton's Leam joins the river.

After Guyhirn there are more houses and we soon came into Wisbech.  Here the channel has concrete or steel pilings alongside and is narrower and therefore faster.  We had been trying the keep our speed down to about 6 mph over the ground but here that was not possible.  To the right you can make out the first of two bridges through the town which are both on fairly sharp bends.  Not that easy to navigate with the current behind you.

Here is the second bridge with the yacht harbour beyond.  Well it's called a harbour but all it consists of is a series of pontoons coming out into the river.  This of course makes the navigable channel even narrower.

Having passed the boats and the moorings we passed a ship (unusual in a narrowboat) and then followed advice from Daryl and turned into the mud bank beyond the ship.  We buried the bow in the mud and the current whipped the stern around.  Lots of revs then to push back against the strong current past the ship and in to moor on the nearest pontoon where we had booked a space.

And here is Leo moored on the visitor pontoon.  We arrived about midday, so that is 15 miles in two and a half hours - not bad speed on a narrowboat.  Later in the evening at high slack water (about an hour and a half after high tide - can you work out why?) with help from another moorer we turned Leo to face downstream for the following day.
So that was Friday.  On Saturday morning we were up early as Daryl arrived about 7 am ready for our Wash adventure.
We set off about 7.45 when we were sure that the tide had turned to ebb.  At first the river was little different to the scenery on Friday.  We passed the big boat lift where our friends' broadbeam, Violanthe, was lifted out, then on down the straight river.  A pilot and a survey boat passed us.  Given the wash they were making it was nice of them to slow down past us and then speed up again.

There's only one bridge between Wisbech and the sea, a swing bridge called Sutton Bridge or sometimes Cross Keys Bridge.  It reminded us of the swing bridges on the River Weaver.  We didn't need the bridge swung as we can squeeze underneath.

Here, below Sutton Bridge, Daryl is pointing out something to Ian as we pass the line of boats moored there.  It was raining at this point but fortunately it cleared later.  By this point the river is wider.

We passed another ship, Eems Sun, which brings building materials from Eastern Europe.

There are two lighthouses at the mouth of the River Nene - this is the East Lighthouse.  One of them used to be the home of Sir Peter Scott before he went to the West Country to found Slimbridge.

And so, about 10 miles downstream from Wisbech we headed out to sea.

Mudbanks on our right had congregations of seals.  These are probably common or harbour seals.

Here is Leo on the high seas!  As we came down the last of the river there were waves coming towards us and, once at sea, Leo was pitching a bit in the waves.  We soon realised she was not going to sink and in fact rode the waves pretty well.  And Daryl remained cool and unruffled so obviously this was normal.

We certainly look pretty cheerful in this picture, though the wonky horizon gives an idea of the conditions.  You can see the land receding behind us.  The channel marked by buoys zigzagged about and we were often going in odd directions until we passed the Nene Roads buoy and from then on we were beyond the channel and in open water.

The sea was a little choppy on this stretch and the bow fender is taking a ducking here.

Our son, David, had joined us for this crossing and here Daryl, Helen and David are shown in weather which was noticeably improving.  We even had odd spells of sunshine, though distant views were quite murky.

After a few miles going broadly north in open water we saw the first buoy - Alpha - of the channel into Boston.  Once we turned into the channel, the sea was much calmer.

By this time the tide had fallen and sandbanks were visible all round us.  On this sandbank were some Brent Geese which we had not seen before.

Daryl encouraged us to pick up speed as we were going now against the last of the tide and had to get over a sand bar to find the best place to beach the boat while the tide turned.  We crept slowly across the bar but did not catch.  The waves looked different here, marking the shallows.

By this point, having cleared the bar, we were cruising along with sandbanks either side.  Daryl then told us to turn through 90 degrees and head for the sand.  Having put our bow on the sand, David then took off his shoes and socks and carried the anchor onto the bank and pushed it into the sand.  So we were fixed for the next hour and a half while we waited for the tide to start to flood in.

This is the first time we've used the anchor.  It was proper sand, not muddy at all, and we walked across the bank to the other side.  We were effectively moored to an island in the middle of the Wash.

Here is Leo marooned on a sandbank. 

Time to get back onboard having explored our island. We enjoyed a lunch of bacon butties and salad.  We had beached about 1.15 pm and had just finished lunch when we noticed the tide was coming back.  David hoisted the anchor as soon as Leo was properly floating and we backed off before turning the bow towards land.

More seals watched us passing.

Here we are approaching the mouths of the Rivers Welland (to the left) and Witham (to the right).  We kept to the right and then turned into the River Witham.

It was still fairly low tide and we came up the river with the tide between mud banks on either side.  Though we had spells of sunshine it was now rather grey again.  There are pylons in the distance carrying cables over the river but the second tower from the left is Boston Stump, the tower of the church of St Botolph's in the town.

As we came up the river we passed a fleet of fishing boats moored outside the dock, on the river.

At one point we came through a narrows where high steel piling narrows the river.  This is where they are building the new Boston Barrage designed to prevent flooding in the town.

Though there was a fair bit of mud on either side we later saw what this looked like at low tide - just a tiny stream down the middle with mud everywhere else.  The River passes the fine historic buildings and goes just below the Stump under numerous bridges.

Finally we came round a bend and saw the Grand Sluice in front of us.  The lock is to the right of this structure but we had to wait for 10-15 minutes until there was enough water to let us in.

Here is Leo going into the lock.  The lock is in fact too short for Leo and we were expecting to go straight through 'on a level'.  However the lock keeper closed the outer 'sea doors' which have the 'V' of the gates facing the tidal water and we then waited until the tide rose to keep those gates closed so that it was possible to open the river gates and let us out.  At Daryl and the lock keeper's request we experimented with closing the normal lock gates on Leo.  Without fenders this would have been possible so I guess the lock would in fact take a 55 or 56 foot boat, though fitting two in side by side would not work.
And here is Leo coming out of the lock onto the non-tidal River Witham where we are now moored a short way up on the visitor moorings.  We arrived about 5.30 pm.  We had a great day crossing the Wash and would recommend it.  Take a pilot, better still take Daryl as pilot and make sure your boat is reliable with new fuel filters and a clean diesel tank and only do it when the weather conditions are suitable.  Our forecast was for winds up to force 2 or 3.  Any more would have been scary.  At no point did we feel the boat was being stressed and engine revs were generally much less than doing the Ribble Link or the tidal Severn.

8 comments:

  1. Well done you two what an achievement.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks, an interesting read. I hope you don't mind me adding a link to https://nbsg.wordpress.com/washing/

    Best wishes

    ReplyDelete
  3. On the difference between high water and slack water, there is a similar phenomenon at Denver.

    If I remember right, the denser salt water is flowing in at the bottom of the river, and the less dense fresh water is flowing out at the top of the river. This results in the water rising even though the tide looks as though it is ebbing, and will delay slack water (when the top of the river is still) until after high tide.

    When we did the trip from Wisbech to the Dog, there was very little fresh water flow and so we grounded on a silt bar half a mile from the lock, bang on high tide. The lockkeeper opened the sluice and sent a few hundred tons of water down to lift us off!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Excellent account. It sounds quite an adventure.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Been waiting to follow your adventures again... what a way to start..Have a good season..

    ReplyDelete
  6. Brilliant read, loved messing around with the tides on the broads in a hireboat, but sadly the other ‘arf wouldn’t be happy doing this with our home (nb)!!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Really enjoyed this trip we went the opposite way to you. 17th of April 2021 07.25 we came out the locks at Boston , to wisbech and onto Dog in a Doublet lock. We was in 27 foot narrowboat couldn't really find a sandbank to moor up on but waited outside the estuary for about 2 hours before coming in and stopped at the 1st pontoon at Spalding just before Sutton Swing bridge. We stopped their for about 1 hour as it was empty before going onto wisbech. I have done this route few times we used to go to Kings Lynn as well from Butlins Skegness. This is where we launched our jet ski from , but this was on jet ski about 12 years ago.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Really enjoyed this trip we went the opposite way to you. 17th of April 2021 07.25 we came out the locks at Boston , to wisbech and onto Dog in a Doublet lock. We was in 27 foot narrowboat couldn't really find a sandbank to moor up on but waited outside the estuary for about 2 hours before coming in and stopped at the 1st pontoon at Spalding just before Sutton Swing bridge. We stopped their for about 1 hour as it was empty before going onto wisbech. I have done this route few times we used to go to Kings Lynn as well from Butlins Skegness. This is where we launched our jet ski from , but this was on jet ski about 12 years ago.

    ReplyDelete

If you ask a question in a comment it may be worth knowing that for some reason at present I am unable to reply to a comment unless you choose to let me have your e mail address.