Another hemisphere.

I wish the title went to explain why it has been a week since I put up a blog, and that it was because we had jetted off to leave the Christmas shopping behind in cold England as it seems to be what many boaters seem to do. But no, it meant that we traveled the 15 miles to the coast that is  actually east of the Greenwich meridian and so in another hemisphere. We love the Holderness coast and Spurn Point on a nice day in the winter. In the summer it can be very busy as it makes a great place for kids. Which ever the wind direction you can find a spot to sit on the sand, with the dunes etc etc. I used to travel up and down Spurn Point to the Pilot Station there and even then we would have occasional periods on a top spring tide with an added tidal surge that the water would wash over and  make the road impassable. Spurn Point is a long spit of land at the mouth of the Humber estuary caused by the movement of sand eroded from the coast south of Flamborough Head, moved by longshore drift, meeting the flow out of the river. There have been many Spurn Points and called many that have been eroded as the coast to the north has been consumed and then it has re-established it's self further to the west. There was a major port town on one of the spits called Ravenser in the 14th Century and in 1399 Henry Bolingbroke landed there and went on to become Henry IV when he deposed Richard II.

The timbers mark the seaward line of where the road and railway line once were. They are actually the Victorian sea defences that have delayed the loss of the point for many years.

The road was supplemented by a railway line when a gun battery was built in the First World War. This then had a garrison to man it and to assist construction a railway was laid from the north end of the point where it joins the mainland to the tip over three miles south. Various lighthouse have been built on the point and the remaining one does not have a light for navigation but still stands tall. In 1810 a lifeboat station was built on the point and as it was difficult to reach quickly a crew, and their families, lived on the point. After WWI the railway was utilised by the lifeboat crew and others by resting a bogey on the lines and using wind power.

A sailing railway bogey in 1933. They lock as thought they are in on of the bunkers that protected the large guns from the war. I think the hut on stilts was the look out house used by the lifeboatmen.

You can see the scale of the timbers by Helen and I

Out to sea could be seen the bases of very many wind towers. most were still awaiting their columns and sails and there was a jack up ship installing one as we watched. It was easily seen as the visibility was magnificent. The road has now been washed away and at just about any spring tide the point now gets washed over. At the point end is still the Lifeboat station but since last August the families live over in Grimsby and the crew live on the point six days at a time in a rota. The pilot station is still manned but all changes and boardings are carried out through Grimsby. There are no plans to build any defences to resist the sea as the Point is owned by the Wildlife Trust and they want nature to take it's course.

Walking back up the beach to the little village of Kilnsea to visit the Crown and Anchor and a lovely fish and chip lunch. I lovely day in a very under rated part of the world. And all at the request of my daughter on her birthday.