Mersea Expedition

On the 14th July we had a great turnout of 15 for our annual visit to Mersea Island. Those attending were Andy & Linda Lacy, John & Deborah Ellis, Owen & Rowena Dimond, Steve & Dianne Fletcher, Maurice & Barbara Humberstone, Tony & Lorraine Goodwin, Joe Coulson,

Simon Barker and myself. On arrival the sun was shining and the wind blowing nicely, so some of us took to the water on long and short boards for a good afternoon session. In the evening 7 of us cycled to the Fox pub for a nice and reasonably priced meal. We then returned to the on site club to watch the first semi final of the world cup.

Wednesday dawned still with sunshine and even more wind, so we decided to do an early round island bike ride. We were joined for the day by Martin Gunn who lives in the area, and 8 of us enjoyed the normal Island circuit, including a coffee and cake stop at the Vineyard. On our return at midday those with shortboards took to the water with varying degrees of success in a challenging and confused sea state. In the evening we had an early BBQ and then sat through another difficult evening watching England's failed attempt at reaching the world cup final, very disappointing!

With a steadier 12kt wind forecast for Thursday and the sea looking fairly flat, 7 of us set off to cruise round the island. On launching at 11.00 conditions looked perfect but half way along the south of the island the wind dropped and the wave size increased. By the time 4 of us reached the SE end of the island we were fairly spread out and the waves had grown even bigger, so we decided to land at Coopers beach camp site and regroup. On landing Steve phoned to say he had landed half way along at the youth camp and that 2 others had turned round and returned to base.

At this point we decided to abort the trip and the shore crew of Andy and Joe sprang into action and retrieved us all safely back to base. It's the first time in 30 years that we have not got round the island, but I have never seen such a big swell coming off the north sea before. In the evening we cheered ourselves up by visiting a nice restaurant overlooking West Mersea harbour with 13 of us enjoying mainly sea food while admiring a spectacular sunset over the harbour, a lovely way to round off what had been a great week of sailing, cycling and socialising in this great location.

Richard