Musings from a Muddy Island photos reincarnated

My Musings days are well and truly over, but since this blog still gets more hits in a day than my others receive in a month, I thought I'd post this video here - a montage of photos of Mersea which appeared on Musings from a Muddy Island in years gone by. All part of my new business venture (a sideline, not a principal source of income, don't worry!), which you can, should you wish, find out more about here.



If you enjoyed that, there are more photos from the Muddy Island on the other videos in our youtube channel .

The Packing Shed

Gazing at the sunset this evening, as the children and I ate our picnic supper sitting on our upturned dinghy on the beach, reminded me that Mersea's famous Packing Shed  (on the left in the photo above) is currently celebrating the 20th anniversary of its restoration.

There will be a Packing Shed Open Day this coming Sunday, starting at 2pm, with motor launches leaving the hammerhead at regular intervals through the afternoon, to transport visitors to and from Packing Shed Island. Ferry tickets are £3 (adults), £1 (children), and the price includes a cream tea in the Shed, freedom to stroll around the island, with its abundant wildlife and lovely views of West Mersea, and the opportunity to learn a bit about the history of the Shed from members of the Packing Shed Trust.

At the end of the nineteenth century, Mersea's oyster industry was burgeoning. 'Mersea Natives' were transported by Thames sailing barge to Billingsgate Market in London and many thousands more were exported to the Continent. Cleaning and sorting oysters by size became an important part of the preparation process for export and sale. The first Packing Shed was built around 1890 by the Tollesbury and Mersea Native Oyster Fishing Company. Soon, more than 60 fishermen were working in and around the Shed, grading and packing their catch.

However, after a few years in operation, the original shed was completely destroyed in a storm. A replacement was built in 1897 and that Shed was used almost continuously until the late 1950s, when the industry collapsed as a result of the first post-war oyster disease. A second, smaller, shed was built in 1920 but that, too, was destroyed in gales and floods.  After the 1950s, the original Shed was used occasionally for the storage of fishing gear, but was eventually abandoned and left to rot.

After the ravages of the great storm of 1987, all that remained was a bare skeleton - picturesque and beloved of artists, but liable to total collapse at any moment. It was at this point that a group of volunteers decided that the building had to be restored, once and for all, or it would disappear into the sea and be lost forever.  Today, thanks to the dedication of the current Trust and other volunteers, and funded entirely by public donations, the Shed is not only an important historical landmark, but is also available for hire as a venue for parties, dinners, and even wedding receptions for the more adventurous bride and groom.

You can read all about the restoration - and lots more besides - on the Packing Shed website . 

Unfortunately, the Shed now faces another threat - erosion. The island on which it sits is being gradually eaten away by the sea, so a huge amount of money has been raised to replace the original shells and sand with granite ballast. The first wave of reinforcement has proved successful but the process is going to have to be continuous if the Shed is to survive, so fund-raising remains a priority.

The Packing Shed is featured in the 'save our seaside' pages of this month's Coast magazine.

TBTE

West Mersea Town Regatta 2010

The West Mersea Town Regatta  has been running since 1838 and forms a wonderfully festive end to Mersea Week .  This year, as always, there were sailing races in the morning for smacks, yachts, dinghies and open fishermen's boats, with up to 150 boats taking part, so it was quite a spectacle.
I didn't go out sailing that day - I had relatives arriving during the morning and the races start very early - but the TM and crew, Richard and John, put up a magnificent show in Black Diamond, winning the Fast Classics race with style.  Sailing photos below are by Leafy, who was out with her camera, racing on her family's beautiful boat, Ivy Green.

Once the racing crews were ashore, it was time for the immensely popular water sports  - an entertaining range of fun rowing races for all ages as well as the famous 'greasy pole' competition.

In previous years there has always been a bit of a lull immediately after the watersports, when people tend to drift off home, but this time there was a new event, 'Song & Dance' - brainchild of Regatta Commodore Chrissie Westgate - to keep the waterfront buzzing. Two and a half hours of shanty singing, ceilidh dancing and live bands, with hot and cold food and a bar.

It was all great fun, very family-friendly, and well worth all the hard work before, during and afterwards. There were real live eighteenth-century Pirates on parade and joining in the dancing, too!  After the day's prizegiving ceremony, the Regatta ended in the usual way with the magnificent Grand Firework Display, which half the island (or so it seemed) turned out to enjoy.

(The images on the poster I put together to publicise the Song & Dance (below), are by island artist and doyen of the greasy-pole, Leafy Dumas, whose lovely website and blog you can find here.)

These are a few representative pictures. Lots more can be found on the Town Regatta website and on the Mersea Session blog.

My Mersea Week IV - Shanty Night

To celebrate the spirit of Mersea Week, the Coast Inn Acoustic Session held a special nautically themed night on Thursday 12th August.

We advertised it as 'Shanty Night' - and traditional seafaring tunes certainly played a large part in the evening's musicmaking - but all kinds of songs inspired by the sea (some with a fairly tenuous link) appeared - from The Drunken Sailor (twice!), to Row Your Boat (played by IM on the piano - the evening's youngest performer and witness to my lax parenting standards), to Yellow Submarine (at which point, as if from nowhere, a fantastic visiting trumpeter appeared at the window and inserted the solo twiddly bits with considerable panache, which brought the house down).

A couple of hours before kick-off, we made the executive decision NOT to hold the event outdoors - despite the gorgeous late sunshine and a holding-off of the forecast rain, there was a stiff breeze blowing straight into the garden of the Coast Inn, which would have dispersed the sound and made conditions too chilly for drinkers. So we held it in the bar as usual, which made for a packed-out night, but it all added to the atmosphere. A record number of musicians and singers turned up, plus all the regular punters and plenty of visitors (including lovely fellow-Mersea Blogger Teresa, aka Tarviragus, although unfortunately the occasion did not lend itself to much in the way of quiet chatting).

Next morning, the general consensus on the island was that Shanty Night had been a Jolly Good Thing, which should certainly be repeated next year. So perhaps we've started a grand new tradition for Mersea Week - it would be rather nice to think so.

Here are a few grainy pics (I don't like using flash - it's too distracting for performers): lots more can be found on the Mersea Session Website. As explained there, the bar was so crowded that I ended up trapped, standing on a table, by the fireplace, camera in one hand, tambourine in the other, glass of Guinness balanced precariously above me - hence the unvarying viewpoint of these photos.