Two Rivers

Whenever I look at the view from my balcony I am reminded of another river, the Humber estuary, unromantic despite Andrew Marvell's best efforts, its brown whorls almost always covered by a steely lid of cloud. Growing up in Hull, we would go to the pier late on a Sunday afternoon for an ice cream. My Grandad, a rollup cupped in his hand, would walk along trailing sweetly pungent smoke while Grandma sat in the car watching the New Holland packet come in to dock.

Treading out over wooden decking with the water roiling below, we would look out over the mile wide river mouth towards the low shore of Lincolnshire, as seagulls swooped and bobbed, and barges made their slow procession up to Goole or down to Spurn.

Behind the ice cream kiosk began the series of abandoned docks with cobbled wharves, rusting rings, bollards and weeds, that evoked a feeling of proximity to a lost world, as if the ships and shouting stevedores were still there behind a veil, thriving in a pool of light.

Piling back into the Hillman Minx we would drive home, my Grandad singing all the songs he could think of with the word "sunshine" and scaring us by taking his hands off the wheel to clap.


Top: Hudson River from my balcony
Bottom: Victoria Pier and River Humber
©Copyright Paul Glazzard and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.