Following the previous evening's fire and barbeque, we had a slow and relaxing start. Sirenia's crew came over by tender for a full english breakfast, and then half an hour later tied up alongside us and we prepared for a grand adventure!.... today was the day that we, aboard Sirenia, were to sail around Horsey island, through Horsey Mere and over the wade causeway, in the footsteps of the Swallows and Amazons!

Timing was everything.... with the Wade causeway and Horsey mere drying upto 2.8m, then we needed a good percentage of the spring tide to get over the shallows... we set off 1.5hrs before HW, and made our way out to Hamford water.... the usual quantity of anchored boats enjoying the tranquility, made a little more challenging by the thick fog.... as we approached the end of Hamford water, towards Kirby creek, the visibility lifted again, and ahead we could see a boat aground... a sign of things to come?

We crept carefully into Kirby creek, avoiding grounding by generous use of the keel raising mechanism on Sirenia, and crept towards the end where it went green on the charts... drying grounds!... the further we progressed, the less and less boats we saw, with only the real east coast ditch crawlers making it this far!... eventually the anchored boats vanished completely, and we were in silent backwaters, occupied only by wildlife.

Soon we approached Honey island, which would mark our turning point into Horsey Mere itself... the charts showed the water around this island as drying to 2m, but with two small pools that remained with 3 and 4.9m respectively.... as we crept past the island, and saw the pools, we were delighted to see two old wooden boats sitting on their moorings in these pools..... the stereotypical East coast mooring... with heavily restricted access, and 100% complete peace and quiet!

We passed the boats and into the mere...now it got tricky.... water so shallow that even the withies had stopped....

Around the next corner, 3 large seals sat on the mud banks, surprised at seeing a boat in their usually undisturbed surrounding... they did however agree readily to pose for photos before slipping off to find somewhere quieter.

The charts showed a twisting winding course for the channel, which would be challenging as at the state of tide we had, the mere was a lake of 1/2nm across.....

So we found our way by edging gingerly until the sounder alarm went off and then altering course.... In reality we should have used a lead line or a marked stick... but we were lacking such essentials!... we hit the bottom numerous times, but eventually found our way to the wade causeway, which we crossed very slowly, and the headed towards the start of the Twizzle.... we soon reached deeper water (the luxury of 3.5m!!!) and worked our way to just shy of Titchmarsh marina, where we anchored for lunch....