Page published 14 October 2024
2 June 2024 - Departing Wayford
Our seven week cycle of our granddaughter's visits to us are soon to finish. She'll be starting school in September and her mother's changed jobs so there's no longer weekend night shifts to cover every seven weeks. But that's for the future. The forecast was good, so Diana had planned that for our first trip from the new mooring, we would go for an afternoon cruise on Singing the Blues with a sandwich lunch taken aboard.
It's 13:10. Our granddaughter is aboard, we're loaded, the engine is running and we're ready to go.
We're half way down the dyke and still there are a hundred yard to go and many berths to pass before we reach the river.
Once out of the dyke we turn right and motor another couple of hundred yards past Wayford Marine's boatyard, before reaching Wayford Bridge.
Once above the bridge you pass two houseboats before the river turns and you see six more. I believe these are the same boats that were moored here in the 1960s when I first saw them in a Blake's Boating Holiday brochure.
Thirteen minutes into the cruise an I try to manoeuvre the boat close enough to the bank to read the signs on the bank - and fail. I can make out references to the Glamping pods that I know are on the bank a little way up the North Walsham and Dilham Canal.
The notice boards are found at the junction of the North Walsham and Dilham Canal, now a private waterway, and the main navigation. I believe the signs advertising the glamping pods only appeared in the last couple of years. They replaced one with black lettering on white boards that you could read from a distance and requested tolls to be paid in a box found a little way upstream. I remember it from the occasions I went Canoeing with Diana and with My Brother more than ten years ago. Unfortunately, on neither occasion did I photograph the signs found there at that time.
The North Walsham and Dilham Canal is the artificial navigation, opened in 1812, that follows the route of the River Ant towards its source near Antingham, north of North Walsham. When you make the left turn I used to believe that you were following the Ant with an upper part at the head of navigation known as "Tyler's Cut".
Google Maps wrongly marks this route as part of the North Walsham and Dilham Canal. As with all of the rivers that are part of the Broads they have been managed by man since medieval days and earlier. They are not in the slightest bit natural, so perhaps it's understandable that Google thought it was part of the same canal.
I tried to find out exactly which part of the waterway is "Tyler's Cut". Sources such as the Broads Authority and Wikipedia are vague. The most precise is description I have found is on the Canal Routes site. Referring to the Ant beyond the start of the canal, it says:
Beyond the junction, the navigable route continues north westward for just one more mile. Strictly speaking this waterway is the Smallburgh River though the first ½ mile is known as Dilham Dyke and the final ½ mile is known as Tyler's Cut. This section has been used by boats for many centuries though during the 1900s it became disused and silted up. It later became the first stretch of Broads waterway to be restored by an independent society.
I'm inclined to accept this definition as OS 1:25,000 mapping does only label the final part as Tyler's Cut and shows the miil as "Dilham Dyke Drainage Mill", although other OS mapping labels the same buildings "Wayford Mill".
You'll find better views of the Dilham Dyke Drainage Mill buildings taken on my canoeing trips with Diana and Mike, linked above, but back then the mill cap was still to be restored.
Approaching Dilham
By 13:30 we were just beyond the first half mile after the canal junction where we meet a couple of stand up paddle boarders.
After taking what was the last mooring space available we have lunch. There's some comings and goings taking place as we leave the boat at 14:08 to take a walk around Dilham.
© 2018 Adrian S Pye
We walk down the road to discover that, in the grounds of the village hall, there's some kind of artisan fair going on. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures of my own and this is the most recent one I could find of the playground where our little one spent most of her time.
Click on the map to open, in a new tab/window, a version large enough to read all the detail.
Writing this a few months after the event, I can't recall exactly what the event was that was taking place on the recreation ground next to the village hall. I do remember there were a number of craft stalls, perhaps focused on horses. If my memory is vague that's because most of our time there was on the playground equipment.
I think things may have changed in the playground area, too, since the photograph I found was taken. I don't recall the fencing seen in the photograph
We didn't stay long and soon walked back to the moorings. I took a photograph of the local information board that's on display there. There's nothing to say who erected or funded it, so I suspect it was the parish council, as the Broads Authority are not normally bashful about notices for which they are responsible.
By 14:54 we had cast off and were following another boat half way down Tyler's Cut. In the 1970s father used to have the mooring for his SeaHawk at Dilham and my memory says none of the trees on the left of the cut were there then.
Passing through Wayford
Our plan for the rest of the afternoon was to visit Barton Broad. That meant passing by the houseboats near Wayford Bridge again. This time we see the six other boats.
As we approach Wayford Bridge we are still following the cruiser that left the Dilham moorings at the same time as us.
Wayford Bridge is on a curve in the road and the road is banked so approaching from the north it gets lower as you pass under it. The board that's fixed under it is intended as a warning.
There's a number of businesses clustered around Wayford Bridge and always plenty of boats to be seen. It's 15:13 as we cruise past.
On Barton Broad
We reach Barton Broad around 15:50. There's a light northerly breeze we make a sweeping U-turn to the left and head out of the main channel towards the reed lined bank and drop the mudweight over the bows.
We swing gently from side to side in the breeze, so have a constantly changing view while sipping tea and munching cake. We enjoy the view over the stern where a yacht doesn't seem to be able to make up it's mind about whether or where to drop their mudweight.
Return to Wayford
We don;t stay too long at Barton and I find myself taking a photo of Hunsett Mill at 16:36. I've got a feeling that I'll be taking many more of the landmark - and having various moans about it!
My last picture of the day is taken at 16:52. We've just turned into Long Dyke and on our way to our mooring. We need to get our young one home in time for her meal, bath and bed.
Next: Greg attends A Safari Owner's Meet.