Country Life

The tide waits for no man

THE sky is banded in bold strata of many hues. Beneath a blood-orange sunrise, the otherworldly madness of a curlew cry is all I have for company as my little boat slips silently into the mirrored estuary. The tide —visible via the urgent riffles that swell and spin past—is reaching its spring zenith, a barely credible 13ft, all told. I’m sliding gently across the saltwater, up only one inlet of the myriad forgotten creeks surrounding Norfolk’s fabled and crustacean-laden, saltmarsh-ringed coastline.

A boat without an engine, sailing on the timeless power of wind and tide, is an ancient thrill

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