Fording the river Esk, like the Romans

My wife's great Aunt's family lived in a small house on the sand dunes at Eskmeals in Cumberland. As with Tyneham in Dorset, or Imber on Salisbury plain, the MoD came along at the beginning of the 20th Century and requisitioned the land. At Eskmeals, they were moved a short way away, and the 1920s replacement is still in the family, used over generations as a holiday home. The nature reserve is often closed to visit during the working week.  

Walking down to the nearby estuary, wading in the shallows, and watching people getting stuck whilst squeezing cars under the railway viaduct at high tide has long been a family pastime. Indeed, as we arrived for our week here, there was an Audi with bonnet up, still sat there three hours later, awaiting repair.   

Looking at the map, there is a ford directly across the river. A Natural England warning sign highlights the tidal nature, and suggests that its untenable to cross until a suitable bridge is in place. This tantalisingly suggests that there is a plan for a bridge. 

So with the privilege of staying in the closest house, and a week to consider, I wondered just how untenable the crossing is. Surely it is a ford because historically people crossed here on foot as well as on horseback ?  A photo online shows a horserider splashing through quite shallow water.  But I can find nothing online highlighting how deep the ford actually is.

I was impressed by Ruth's walking blog, which describes getting between here and Ravensglass, a short hop across the River Esk. https://coastalwalker.co.uk/2016/12/08/eskmeals-range-to-ravenglass/  She however described, in November, the uncertainties facing anyone who thinks of crossing here, and indeed, also at another ford at Hall Waberthwaite further up river. She ended up walking 3 miles up river to cross via the busy Muncaster bridge on the A591, and of course 3 miles back down the other side. 

I should make a clear warning here. This is a tidal river, but also, being the Lakelands, the flows will be affected greatly by rainfall. Do your own research, be cautious, and be prepared to turn back. 

However, a quick look at the tide tables https://www.tideschart.com/United-Kingdom/England/Cumbria/Ravenglass-Beach/ told me two things. Low water was at 9am the day after I arrived, and that as this was near spring tides, with higher low waters as my week progressed. The Low water mark was 1.7 metres above chart datum.  High water at 2:44pm was 5.3 metres higher. My best chance for exploration was immediately.

As a student of sailing (you never graduate), I was able to check the charts.  The datum levels show the whole river drying, which is unlikely given the river flow. but perhaps possible at an Equiox. The 5M drying contour and the spot reading of 2.7M drying highlights that it should be achievable.(this is Navionics, but the Admiralty chart shows the same soundings).

From the kitchen window, you can almost see the crossing point, and at 8am, there was a quad bike stopped for quite a while. I had thought to take an early look anyhow, but perhaps I could grab local knowledge too. Sadly as I walked down, he was on his mobile phone, the scourge of enabling live conversations, so we nodded hello, and I walked on.   

There is no usable depth gauge on the viaduct, but out on the nature reserve to the left, aside from the stone pillars of the viaduct, there is a fence row of concrete posts out into the water.  One hour before low water, it looked like this;

There are holes in the posts, I thought these might be a useful guide, but actually I couldn't see them later when I crossed. So half an hour later, I was back. Did I mention the warning?

Not knowing the nature of the bottom, and expecting mud, I had a change of shoes, maybe appropriately, Lakeland Aquashoes. And a stick to maybe test the way. Actually I could have walked it in my sandals.

This picture is halfway across. I didn't take the line of the marked "Ford", but somewhat closer to the viaduct. Not much more than ankle height wading to here. 

The second half is a bit deeper, but only came half way up to my knees. It looked like there was a deeper patch closer to the viaduct. The base of the pillars, and the posts between the pillars are perhaps helpful in assessing the depth.   

So having crossed the Esk with relative ease, I thought I'd look too at the Warberthwaite crossing. On a map of 1899 which hangs on the cottage wall, this is marked as a Roman Ford, perhaps part of the Military route from Lancaster via the Hardnock Fort down Eskdale to Ravensglass as described by R.G. Collingwood in a 1927 study.  

I started up the mudflats rather than joining the grandly titled Cumbria Coastal Way, but on joining it, I overshot the indistinct path to the ford, walking onto the permissive park track through the grounds of Muncaster Castle. So this picture was looking back downriver towards the crossing point. The actual line of the crossing is not clear, though the target, the end of the road by the houses is plain.

There were a couple of bits of wood in the river, that could have been withies, but I wouldn't guarantee they'll still be there after any flood. There was a fairly indistinct path to the waters edge, and a bit of a scramble down to the mudflats.

Its now 9:15am, so a bit after the low water tidal prediction that I had for Ravensglass. The flow is definitely still downriver, so I looked to cross at the widest point. On this crossing, the level came above my knees, just catching my shorts at one point. 

A scruffy barking dog greeted me as I climbed towards the bank. Once I had risen off the mudflats, it wandered away, returning to more quietly observe the invader again as I neared the houses. From here I took the path south to Newbiggen, which was mostly an attractive lane between two hedges. Here was the third and smallest ford, you could almost jump across it, but it seemed churlish to ignore the footbridge  provided.

But in turning right to take the photo above, I missed the footpath onwards to Eskmeals house, and returned instead via the road.

The slightly surprising thing, on returning from a subsequent walk on the nature reserve at around 12:30pm, was that the tide didn't seem to have come up by much. The fencing posts and central sandbar were both still visible. I didn't attempt, but it felt like the crossing would still be viable. I'll aim to check again later in the week.

From the display board at the ford, Natural England ran an EU Funded project back in 2016, part of the English Coast Path study, which determined that the ford is unviable, and therefore a walking bridge link across the gap is needed. It would have been good if rather than spending loads of money restating the obvious, they had perhaps just worked to made the link actually happen !  https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/360629/whitehaven-silecroft-chpt-3.PDF 

Likewise, in 2020, Network Rail did renewal work on the viaduct, including enhancements which could perhaps have usefully extended to provide public access.
"Engineers will also take the opportunity to upgrade walkways and handrails across the viaduct which are used by railway staff." https://www.newcivilengineer.com/latest/152-year-old-cumbria-viaduct-set-for-vital-repairs-08-06-2020/ It did also look like they had only painted half of the bridge.

Cumbria Council do seem to have an ambition to create a coastal link in their Local Cycling and Walking Improvement Plan (LCWIP), and this link does seem to be included in their West Coast Plans. https://cumbria.gov.uk/planning-environment/cyclingandwalking/default.asp  

In the longer term the county's flood and coastal defence strategy seems to leave this area, including the road at Eskmeals, to the lap of the gods.

https://www.cumbria.gov.uk/elibrary/Content/Internet/6640/17802/17803/43783152329.pdf  

Meanwhile, I guess the best way to experience the crossing is to do as the Romans did, to walk across near low tide.

When visiting the small church of Hall Warburthwaite, nestled right down by the river, where generations of the Falcon family of Eskmeals were buried (and the door has defences against sheep sheltering in the porch), there was reference to the church services having been arranged in previous centuries at times to enable the parson to ford the river to officiate, this brings up images of him hitching his hassock high, and braving a winter wetting. There was also a sign I had missed on the southern bank, which referred to the DEEP ford here. I mentioned that I'd crossed to a neighbour, who said that they enjoy it during the summer months, but she was surprised that I had attempted the higher crossing.  

I did go back on Friday, at about 2:30pm, some time after the predicted low tide. The water seemed even lower than before, and only came up to my ankles at the deepest part. The bed is slightly firmer following the line marked on the map  And this was how it looked.

 

I wouldn't recommend attempting it after heavy rainfall or in bad weather, and if in doubt, best to take the long road, but hopefully the descriptions and pictures above are helpful if you think of giving it a go.