"The Most Perilous Byway In England"

I joined a guided walk of The Broomway this afternoon. It's an ancient route over the Maplin Sands to Foulness Island. It used to be marked by posts topped with broom bushes but none of these remain. It was the only access to Foulness Island on foot until the Havengore bridge was constructed in 1922.

We started our adventure at Wakering Stairs along a causeway that soon peters out. The entire area is under the control of the MoD and used for weapons testing. I used to hear the guns from my home in the Dengie Hundred as a child. I didn't dream that I would one day walk the range. Care has to be taken because of the risk of live ordnance and craters in the sand caused by bombs result in quicksand. It is said that if one falls in the quicksand it will only reach one's waist but one will drown in the incoming tide which flows faster than a man can walk. Many lives have been lost in the area over the years.

The beauty of it is the feeling of solitude. Our guide told of a man from Switzerland who was moved to tears by the differentness of the place. 

We walked to Asplins Head and back. My pic shows the group by The Maypole which is a marker for the entrance to Havengore Creek. Amazing to think that we were standing where craft ply their way into the Thames Estuary when the tide is high.