Roger Butler explores creeks and channels
A WHIFF OF SALTY AIR drifted over the Slipper Mill Pond at Emsworth. This saline lagoon by the northern edge of Thorney Island was built in the 1780s and powered a flour mill until 1936. Today, the pool is managed for its wildlife interest and the boats moored in the adjacent muddy creek hinted at the maritime heritage of Chichester Harbour.
A bustling modern marina was the gateway to the coast and a series of wild marshes and pebbly strands. Curlews echoed over the shining silt on either side of Nutbourne Channel and a little egret was a Persil-white sentinel at the head of a narrow tributary. Bright
sunshine dazzled against the pale horizons at West Itchenor and Longmere Point.
The path hugged the shore beyond Prinsted and swung south towards Chidham Point. Across the mudflats, the eastern end of a channel known as the Great Deep was visible. This broad sweep of rushing water slices right through Thorney Island and acts as a moat to the former RAF base. Locals claim a large plane once missed the runway and still lies entombed somewhere out in the sludge. And when rescue vehicles were sent they got stuck too!
Beyond the point, I pushed through dense blackthorn, keeping a wary eye on the neighbouring ditch. The scratchy branches eventually won the day and I clambered down to the shingle by Nutbourne Marshes. The satisfying crunch of flint took me onto the weed-covered shoreline, where a scattering of old bricks had been washed into gentle abstract sculptures. A couple of avocets swayed back and forth by a meandering rithe – the local name for the tortuous rivulets that are revealed twice a day by the falling tide.
It was all change at Cobnor Point, where a band of unusual twisted oaks formed a frilly fringe at the foot of the low grassy cliff. These looked half-aquatic and their contorted branches could have been the tentacles of a huge octopus. Each tree seemed to be stretching every sinew in an effort to reach the sea, and dappled light turned their freshly emerged leaves into a hue of buttery yellow.
A strange row of well-worn double stakes ran out across the nearest sandbank. These were placed here back in the 1870s by a group of local farmers who hoped to build a dam across Thorney Channel in order that the land could be reclaimed for agriculture. A workforce of 150 men laboured to infill the 3,000 stakes with chalk and stone but, after just seven weeks, the structure was breached in a storm.
Two footbridges crossed the entrances to a new lagoon, where soft engineering had created saltmarsh as part of a long-erm coastal protection plan. Waders were busily poking around their new patch and a kestrel hovered over the scrubby woodland at the rear. On the far side of the channel, the buildings at Bosham
Quay glinted in the sun and a number of slipways were reminders of the times when this part of Sussex was alive with sea-going trade.