We have had some dreadful grey and wet weather throughout November, so the chance of two days walking in Essex without rain was very appealing. But first I had to organise an overnight stay somewhere.
I have been using Airbnb for a while now, particularly in the far north of Scotland. They had provided great value for money in those areas where available accommodation is both thin on the ground and sometimes excessively expensive. However, my ‘love affair’ with Airbnb is now over for two reasons. The First, is that I pay Airbnb using PayPal, no money is exchanged between myself and the person letting the room. Airbnb required that they keep my PayPal login details, they say to “save me having to do this, each time I pay” – hardly an onerous chore! What you can do on your online PayPal account is to examine all of the Active automatic payment firms and when I did this on my account I found a number of firms having automatic payment access through my PayPal account. I considered this a potential security threat so I made all of this access Inactive. This included Airbnb. So when I finally found an Airbnb place to stay last week I went through PayPal to pay them. I then had to go through a protracted process to actually pay them AND had to make active future payments automatic. My main gripe here is not having the choice and dealing with an agency that makes it very difficult to pay unless you allow automatic payments. The whole purpose for having and using PayPal is for a degree of protection from firms having your credit card details. Anyway, I made the payment and cancelled the automatic payment again. However, I was not allowed to complete the transaction without a mandatory requirement that I submit an ID check, in the form of a photograph of my passport or driving licence. This was the final straw, I cancelled my ‘pending’ booking’ with them. They had my PayPal login details and other personal details, details that even my own bank does not have! I doubt I will be using them again, which is a shame really because I did meet some very interesting people on some Airbnb stays.
I booked a single night in a Travelodge, which was actually cheaper than the Airbnb. So enough of yet another rant about something I feel quite strongly about.
I left Shropshire very early and this time tried to do something different by avoiding the lower reaches of the M1 and M25 traffic. I thought I would hop across country heading SE after Bedford setting up route points to ensure my sat Nav pointed me in the right direction. It worked quite well until I passed into Hertfordshire and came to a road that was closed throwing me and the sat Nav out. However, I still arrived in Maldon at a similar time to that if I had gone further south.
For my first day I had opted to continue on from Tollesbury to Maldon, leaving until the following day the gap I had left behind at Mersea Island. I parked in an industrial area of the neighbouring town of Heybridge, then walked the mile into Maldon. As I entered the High Street I was approached by a BBC Radio Essex reporter. He was seeking to gauge local opinion about an FA cup tie that was taking place in the town later that evening, when non-league Maldon & Tiptree took on Newport County. The game was sold out and was also to be televised live on National TV.
I caught the 08:35 #95 bus to Tollesbury and made good time. By 09:00 I was making my way around the marina in Tollesbury. The morning was lovely and sunny, with only a few clouds in the sky to be seen. Today’s walk would be almost entirely along the sea bank. The sea bank provided excellent underfoot walking conditions, being for the most part dry and with short grass. In no time I arrived at Shinglehead Point where I had great views across to Mersea and Bradwell on the shore of the River Blackwater. Apart from the odd dog-walker I had the Sea bank to myself.
After passing around the Tollesbury Wick Marshes, I was almost back at Tollesbury, albeit a short distance to the south. I was now heading upstream along the River Blackwater. The sea bank here, although easy to walk on was never a straight line, making numerous incursions, which made for a more interesting walk. Because everything here is quite low-lying it is always difficult to know what is mainland and are islands. Looking down the Blackwater I could now see the privately-owned 385 acre Osea Island emerging in the distance.
After passing a large caravan park I began to meet more and more walkers on what had now become the sea wall as I drew closer to Heybridge. Here the River Blackwater made a sharp turn around another tidal island called Northey, owned by the National Trust. Passing behind numerous boatyards and marinas I walked over the locks of the Chelmer and Blackwater Navigation. The Sea bank was now just a short distance across The River Chelmer from the historic town of Maldon. Its position on a small hill (38m) is probably what gave it status and prominence over the centuries. After 18 miles this was the end of today’s walk.
Distance today = 18 miles
Total distance = 5,509 miles
Walking the Coast of Great Britain 