A hot weekday morning heralded the arrival of Betty II alongside the floating pontoon at Rowhedge, near Colchester.

A sign warned that mooring was limited to two hours – a shame as I intended going up to Fingringhoe Mill the following day and this was the nearest berth. A burly man with a bushy beard was mortaring in a window on a quayside house. ‘You’ll be all right there for the night,’ he said, wiping sweat from his brow, ‘boats only come up to use the pontoon to visit the pub at weekends.’

My new friend said he would introduce me to the harbourmaster – his next-door neighbour. The ‘harbourmaster,’ turned out to be a water bailiff whose beautiful georgian home with dominant flagpole and lawn running down to the quayside road was, if it came with the job, a ‘result’ as we say in essex.

Either way, as Rowhedge is only afloat for two or so hours each side of HW, the job is something of a doddle as there isn’t much water to actually bailiff. But you do get a lanyard as I discovered when the man himself came to the door dressed in a smart lightweight gilet, new denims and brown suede docksider shoes, which had, as far as I could see, never left their imprint in mud or tide.

Standing on his doorstep in my charity shop shorts, five-day shirt and unlaced deck shoes, I felt the overwhelming need to explain everything and started rambling on about revisiting ports sailed to aboard cambria in my youth. ‘Let’s have a look,’ he said dismissing my ham-fisted mitigation by ushering me off his front doorstep.

As a Rule

‘As a rule,’ he continued, ‘we don’t allow vessels to stay on the pontoon overnight…so can you put her against the wall?’

I looked across at the unfriendly sheet steel piling of lion quay, unlike the pontoon, not fitted with rubber strips, and said that i hadn’t got many fenders. ‘I’ll lend you one,’ he offered. To prepare for my move I took lines up to the ‘wall’ so that I could grab them as I moved betty across.

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The anchor points were daintily picked out in white paint on the green lawn of lion quay. Pretty, but also pretty useless as they were set a good 10ft away from the quay edge meaning I had to double my lines up to reach the river.

That Done

That done, I motored off under the gaze of the bailiff.

I judged the tide stronger than the breeze so nosed into the quay against it only to find it slack in that spot and so, unable to slow down, ranged out into the river again. ‘Throw me a line,’ yelled the bailiff, ‘go astern.’

I ranged round again, this time hoping to use the breeze as a brake, but the quay formed a wind shadow, so I sheared off. ‘Here, take this,’ yelled the bailiff, waving my line in his hand, ‘spring her in.’

On my final run I motored further down river to line her up with the quay and grab the stern line i’d already set up. This time all was good but before I could set up the springs the bailiff yelled: ‘cash or card?’

When He Returned

When he returned, with his card machine, he had changed into a high-vis jacket to flag up, as a warning, his industry in the midday sun.

This time he’d also brought his wife for a look. ‘What a beautiful boat,’ she kindly announced before heading back to her gardening.

As betty took the ground she sank into soft mud and sat upright, but to my irritation there was still plenty of water floating the pontoon.

No boat moored there that day. In fact, only three youths turned up: two lads and a face-painted girl who enjoyed drop-kicking the plastic lifebelt. The only evidence of their visit was some felt-pen graffiti: four phalluses and the legend ‘monkey is here.’

The only evidence of mine was the bailiff’s dangling fender, left lashed on the ladder as he had requested.

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