Step Back in Time - Wivenhoe 100 years ago

"Step Back in Time" was a walk along the High Street put on by the Wivenhoe History Group. Various locations were highlighted and little placards offered details about the past history of many of the buildings along the road. The High Street is the heart of the old town, so it included the butchers, bakers, grocers, chemist and everything else you would expect to see that have, for the most part, been replaced by the Co-Op at the top of the High Street.

I took a few snaps as I walked down the road today but, unfortunately, it was mid-day and I found myself shooting into the sun, so I gave up with buildings after a few shots. There were a lot of cars around, too, so I might wait for a quiet Sunday and do a little walking tour of my own.

You can find historical images and a guide and map at the Wivenhoe's History website.

Plotlands

Plotlands was a 6-part BBC TV show broadcast in 1996 filmed partly in Wivenhoe. I found a news item in a local newspaper recently and photographed the location on Sunday morning. (The column header is actually five photographs stitched together!)

I don't remember watching Plotlands when it came out – it doesn't really sound like my cup of tea. However, I found this preview from the Independent (22 September 1996), which sounds intriguing and reviews that I've found seem fairly positive: it scores 7.4/10 on IMDB. The show starred Amanda Abbingdon, better known today as Mary Morstan (Mrs. John Watson) in Sherlock and Miss Mardle in Mr. Selfridge, and also featured Saskia Reeves (Luther, Wolf Hall), David Ryall (Grandad in Outnumbered), Rebecca Callard (Ruth Walsh in Coronation Street), Philip Whitchurch (Tyler in My Hero) and others.

Down at the quay

On Wednesday (15 October 2014), Mel had to travel up to London early in the morning, so I decided to walk with her down to the station and then carry on to the quay. We had walked along the quay ten days earlier in the blazing sunshine; now, it was misty and the sun was barely out and the views took on a hazy, ghostly aspect.

Our favourite boat is the Yoffee. I haven't a clue what the boat was named after: a Google search turns up the Yoffee Coffee house in Airmont, New York, the Yoffee Frozen Yogurt shop in Port Macquarie, NSW, Australia (4 stars on tripadvisor!) and Norman Yoffee, Professor Emeritus of Anthropology and Near Eastern Studies at the University of Michigan, whose career has "oscillated between the fields of Assyriology ... and Anthropology" according to this biography.

 

Not that it matters. It's our favourite because it makes us think of Yoffy, of Fingerbobs fame.

We had walked along West Quay that Sunday as I wanted to try and get a nice shot across the marshy banks of the Colne out towards Rowhedge. The picture below was the best of the bunch and shows you how gorgeous the weather was last month.

Now, early in the morning, I thought it might be fun to try and get a similar shot in the mist.

As I walked along the quay, I spotted the Yoffee and a couple of other boats and took a series of photos that I thought I'd share.

 

 

 

 

 

 

There's something about misty mornings that makes me think back to when I was a kid. I used to look out of my bedroom window across the fields down to the River Chelmer. A low-lying mist over the river always indicated that it was going to be a hot, sunny day. You could guarantee it. Sadly, I don't have any photos from back then—it didn't seem important because all children believe that nothing will ever change. I could only get a half-decent image from Google street view. My bedroom, off to the right in this shot, overlooked the A130 and then over the fields. Unfortunately, this shot is from ground level, so you don't really get the sense of the fields sweeping away. The nearby trees on the grass banks weren't there in my day.

Happy days.

Photos of Old Wivenhoe

Back in September 2010 I published a couple of photos: one a scene taken from a book of pictures of Wivenhoe from the past and the second a recreation of how the same view looked today.

The first pic. shows the Park Hotel (left) with a horse-drawn wagonette or brake standing out front. The hotel was built in 1863, although the picture, looking down the High Street, was taken in 1905.

Above is how the same view looks today. The hotel became a pub which has now closed; out of shot just off to the left of the picture it is obvious that there has been some building work going on and the former bar has been converted into a coffee shop. We haven't been in yet, but it seems to be quite popular.

Since writing the above we have been into the "coffee shop" – actually a very nice little restaurant called Jardines. I also noticed that Google haven't updated their "street view" for years and this was the scene when their Google car came down the High Street in July 2009.

Anyway, I thought I'd try again with another scene. One of the pubs in the area has a number of old photos of Wivenhoe and I occasionally try to snap one. The photos are never perfect because they're behind glass and I've managed to get some light reflected. But hopefully it's good enough.

This scene is further down the High Street (the road in the above pics) towards the quay. In the foreground is a furniture shop and, a couple of doors further down, is the Greyhound pub. The road leading off to the left is Queens Road and, almost opposite the Greyhound, on the right, is Clifton Terrace, where Dave Wallis lived.

The third picture above is the eerily similar shot from July 2009. Just shows you how little changes over the years and how little damage Mel and I have caused since our arrival in July 2010. No craters, no angry mobs... we really need to try harder.

(* Google photos are © Google)