SILLY SUFFOLK

A trip with Trevor to Ipswich to collect a sail turns into a jaunt.

Out of Ipswich town and we are under the Orwell Bridge, a huge concrete span across Orwell’s estuary. A better view is afforded just along the road in the posh Suffolk Food Hall coffee shop.

Further along the Shotley peninsular, flat lands run up to the Orwell estuary’s edge, plundered by Curlew, Oystercatchers and cackling gulls. Boats rest up for the winter.

Shotley was once home of HMS Ganges. Now the village is barely awake.

All is down at heel; old sailing dinghies nestle up to one another, their shrouds flapping. An old cassette player lays disembowelled on the shoreline.

Looking out across the water, two ports for the price of one view: Felixstowe and Harwich, Suffolk and Essex.  Along the waterfronts ships with Asiatic names bearing impossibly large numbers of containers on deck.

Pale autumn sun turns cloud to a citrus yellow and suddenly deep dark grey rain clouds; drawing materials and cameras are hastily packed away and we retreat westwards to fight the Friday M25.

Part 2 in the series 

Travelling with my Architect 

From Shotley to Harwich

Cranes and Containers  Felixstowe

The Orwell Bridge