Thank you Royal Harwich Yacht Club

I would like to take the opprortunity to thank the Committee and membership of the Royal Harwich Yacht Club, Woolverstone for their warm welcome and wonderful hospitality offered at my recent talk held at the club. The facilities provided were second to none and the turn-out equally so.

Chris Woods

Deben & Ore Entrances caution advised

At this time in the season we advise additional caution when entering either the Ore or Deben as all surveys are due for renewal. As no thorough up-to-date surverys are available, buoy positioning and deepest water can only be approximated. We will conduct our own survey of the Deben for the beginning of March and weather permitting will do the same for the Ore.

Major Eastcoastrivers.com sponsor, Fox's Marina & Boatyard, launches new website

We would like to take this opportunity to wish Fox's Marina & Boatyard great success with their new services website. This is in addition to their Online Chandlery website and concentrates more on the boatyard. With much more information about their services, the site also includes a webcam which currently observes river traffic under the Orwell Bridge. Click to pay them a visit ...

Discontinuation of Orfordness Lighthouse User Consultation - Now closed

We have been advised by members of the Ore and Alde Association of a user consultation by Trinity House regarding the discontinuation of Orfordness Lighthouse. The public release by Trinity House may be found here.

It is of course not within our remit to promote an opinion however you are welcome to express your concerns or agreement with the Trinity House 2010 Aids to Navigation Review in particular with reference to Orfordness Lighthouse. Discuss in our forum ...

Deben Entrance Shoal Warning (12th December 2009)

We have just been informed that recent shoal movements in the Deben Entance have made entry into the river difficult.

Reports indicate the entire area has flattened and shoaled resulting in an unpredictable approach. Without appropriate survey information, our recommendation is to make entry proceeding with high caution toward the top of a high flooding tide. As soon as we establish more, details will be posted here.

The Deben Entrance sketchmap download will be temporarily disabled until the latest shoal configuration can be established.

We are pleased to launch our new forum.

We have just installed new forum software providing a simplified and better user and administrative experience.

Unfortunately our previous forum was innundated with spam registrations to the point we were unable to distinguish between genuine and fake members. This also meant that we were open to the occasional inappropriate posting. There was nothing too serious however this forum software is much easier to manage and keep clean.

The downside is that all users will need to re-register and of course we apologise for this inconvenience.

This forum is still undergoing modification and testing however we welcome your registrations and comments and hope this forum is more pleasing and simpler to use than before. Be one of the first to join in ...

Click to take a look and register

Atlantic Rigging Launch new website

Atlantic Rigging based in Melton Woodbridge have just launched their new website and online rope and rigging shop. We have been informed that the product range will progressively expand to include all manner of both standing and running rigging including shackles and sta lok terminals. We wish Atlantic Rigging great success with their online venture and of course encourage you to take a look...

Ore entrance buoys removed for winter

22nd October 2009 - The Weir and Oxley buoys marking the entrance channel to the River Ore have been removed for seasonal maintenance and will be reinstated in the spring of 2010. It has been debated whether to leave the buoys in place throughout the year and there is a good chance they will be left on station next year by way of a trial.

Currently the buoys are removed for the winter to prevent them from being carried off in winter storms which is quite likely as their ideal placement often coincides with the rapid shelving of the shoals within the entrance. As the Deben entrance entertains a more vigilant and less remote population, it is possible to maintain a closer watch on the Deben Entrance buoys throught the winter.

If resources and weather allow, we hope to conduct a winter Ore entrance survey in order to establish approach waypoints and potential transits. Of course the shoals are subject to particularly frequent change throughout the winter so the resulting sketchmap should be considered at best 'better than nothing'.

Mid Knoll moved

The Mid Knoll (Green) buoy in the Deben entrance has been moved a short distance in a southerly direction to accomodate the continued southerly movement of the Knolls shoal.

The current Mid Knoll position is 51° 58.690N 01° 23.410E

Janet Harbers September Blog

Barges at Snape; Orfordness Lighthouse under threat from the North Sea; smacks and classic yachts at West Mersea; and upper reaches of the Deben and more on Jan's September Blog. Take a look by clicking here ...

Deben - Loders Cut Sketchmap

The Tide Mill Yacht Harbour, Woodbridge have very kindly sponsored trials of our new surveying rig and the resulting sketchmap of Loders Cut and the surrounding area. The sketchmap was produced in order to establish how effective the rig is and to also answer the question of how much water is available in the Cut by comparison with Troublesome Reach.

As it happens there is much more water in Troublesome Reach near Kyson Point but also a good amount of water through Loders Cut which dries to 1.4m above LAT, so with a 3m high tide you should have 1.6m to float in. The tidal differences were calculated from Felixstowe Tide Guage data with a 40 minute offset and 0.1m height compensation. The positive result of this test survey is very encouraging for the provision of more frequent Deben and Ore entrance surveys in 2010 in order to maintain our position as provider of East Coast survey based pilotage information. Click to download it and tell us what you think on our forum.

New portable surveying rig

We have just run some initial tests on a portable surveying rig assisted by new sponsors Seapower Marine, which should allow us to survey more remote areas such as Southwold cost effectively. This will allow us to publish several sketchmaps exclusively online. Of course we will continue to distribute the fully printed sketchmaps for the Deben and Ore.

Tests around Woodbridge will allow us to publish a Deben upper reaches sketchmap as an example where traditional charts fail to provide sufficient detail.

Shop news

We are in the process of updating our online bookshop which will offer a much improved presentation and navigation.

Please remember that purchases on ecrbookshop help directly fund the free services offered by this website. Your support of our shop is therefore greatly appreciated. Remember, we also sell charts !