Faversham (Oare Creek) to Conyer Creek and back 31st July 2010

I had trouble finding a slipway to use in Oare Creek, but someone called Peter came to my rescue. I drove into what I thought was a boat park, but it was a set of private moorings and mud berths. I bumped into Peter wearing a blue boiler suit and mistakenly thought he was in charge, so I asked him where I could launch my boat. Very kindly he took me to his own private slipway. The different moorings were linked to strips of land coming off the creek, and Peter had his two boats shored up on his strip, a South African Yacht based on a fishing boat design, built in fibreglass, but looking like it could be wooden, and a fishing craft called La Diva. “I am so busy I haven’t managed to get launched this year. I really like it here - it is like being back in the 1950’s, it’s so peaceful”. As he drove off in his Volvo I got the boat ready and waited for the tide.

 Peter told me firmly I had only two hours of tide. I needed to get to Conyer and back and it seemed too far. To create more time I launched into the mud and stepped in, pushing the boat out over the mud with an oar. It was just after 3.00 pm, the high tide at 4.20 pm

Just prior to launching: Behind  the pico is the Dutch sloop I had seen near Kingsferry the previous voyage. Peter told me the owner finds it cheaper to keep it at Oare and commute from Amsterdam.


I set off down the creek and passed a number of interesting boats, including the Meeching tug being renovated in Oare Creek.

The Meeching was based for forty years in Newhaven on the South Coast, having belonged to British Rail and worked with the ferries, a main job being also to tow barges out to sea to dump dredging mud – A slight irony being that she ended up in Oare creek. The Meeching had more exciting adventures, as described by Andy Gilbert, the tug master’s son:  ‘October 1968 saw Meeching's most famous incident involving the Norwegian tanker Sitakund. She caught fire in the shipping lanes off Beachy Head after three large explosions in her tanks. While the Royal Navy frigate HMS Mohawk was warning all vessels to keep clear, and the famous Dutch salvage tug Zwarte Zee was making frantic radio calls offering her assistance, Meeching quietly slipped in and made fast. It was my Dad who made the radio call saying simply "We have taken the casualty in tow, by the stern and are proceeding towards Eastbourne bay". This stunned Mohawk's radio operator into silence for a few moments and you could hear the gulp in his voice when he responded with "Roger, wait, out!" The intention was to beach her off Pevensey, but towing a burning and sinking tanker is not an exact science! She eventually grounded on rocks off Eastbourne Promenade, prompting ridiculous comments from some of Eastbourne's councillors about her being deliberately placed there! For the next two days, Meeching led the fire fighting operations, along with the Dominant from Dover and personnel from Eastbourne Fire Brigade. Zwarte Zee did eventually turn up and, like Hermes, got too close. My Dad eventually called her up on VHF radio and threatened to turn high-pressure fire hoses on her if she didn't withdraw - she did!’ In 2000 the Meeching was decommissioned and languished in the Medway until someone decided to revive her.

(source: Andy Gilbert,  http://www.ournewhaven.org.uk/page_id__383_path__0p69p63p.aspx)

An old gaffer was motoring out, overtaking me. Towards the bottom of the creek was a prominently moored smack, CK 318.

The old gaffer passing me. Later on I got ahead of her as I skirted across the mudbanks and she was busy hoisting her sails. She passed me again later on.

Further down was a Colchester smack, theAlberta CK 318. This was built originally in 1885 and rebuilt in the Hollowshore (Testers’s) yard (behind). CK 318 is depicted in a stained glass window in St Mary’s Church Tollesbury. The glass was funded by a Tollesbury born New Yorker Fredrick Hasler who helped restore the church. He requested that CK 318 should be depicted in a window commemorating sailing in the area, with the instructions to the artist  “I wonder if you would mind making the smack CK 318. This was the 'Alberta' owned by a man named Pettican, who was my Congregational School Teacher when I lived in Tollesbury from 1893 to '96. . . . In 1900 I spent a two-week holiday on the 'Alberta' shrimping." A drawing of the window shows the smack on the bottom right.

Source: An article in Yachts and Yachting reproduced on http://www.smackdock.co.uk/church/church.htm

Out in the Swale the wind picked up again and it was obvious I was not going to be able row and sail, the boat heeling too much. So I concentrated on balancing the boat and taking photographs as I sailed past the Harty ferry landing.

Harty Ferry landing which can be reached along a bumpy track.

 Across the Swale was the Ferry Inn House, a white house on the hill.

Looking back I could see Whitstable in the distance behind a moored Thames spritsail barge

The wind got up further as I passed through the moorings. I was averaging over four knots as I sped up the Swale just with the two small sails. The wind got up further and spray was coming in over the bow, turning my cream crackers salty and soggy. Yachts were charging up and down, reaching along in the southerly wind.

I was worried I would run out of time to get to Conyer, but made the number 6 buoy opposite the entrance just ten minutes after high water.

The number 6 buoy with the entrance to Conyer Creek in the background.

On the way back the wind freshened up even further and I found myself using two hands to pull on the rudder lines to stop the boat luffing. The lines were chaffing my ankles as adjusted the rudder to stay on course. I shifted my weight to the side deck, keeping alert so as not to lose control. PicoMicroYacht surged up to six knots, occasionally surfing on the wavelets.

Nearing Faversham creek again I took down the sails. As I secured the sails and fixed the rudder in position for rowing, the wind and tide drifted me down towards the anchored Thames spritsail barge.

A strong wind was coming out of Faversham, so I settled down to a hard row up to Oare Creek.

Inside the Oare the wind moderated and I was able to row over the shallows, quickly reaching the slipway just in time. It was 5.50 pm, an hour and a half after high tide and I only just made it. I was able to push the boat over the mud using an oar, close enough to the slipway to tow the boat out with the car as in my previous voyage.




PicoMicroYacht on the Swale - filmed using an old mobile phone