Just into Face book from Sea Change…..

“Sea-Change to visit Norwich

A voyage to Norwich might have been routine in the 1940s but today it is less simple, getting all the 7 road and rail bridges between Gt. Yarmouth and Norwich to open for the first time in years will be quite a trick and the Thames sailing barge Cambria will have to lower both masts to pass under the A47 Southern bypass. As Sea-Change skipper Richard Titchener says “Well, it wouldn’t be worthwhile if it was easy!”
He added “Cambria used to be a regular trader to Norwich in 1940s and 50s so we thought it would be fun and very worthwhile to make the Port of Norwich the destination for our training voyage this year and re-establish Norwich’s almost forgotten links with the sea”.
The barge’s crew on the passages up and down the coast will be a mixture of experienced sailing barge hands and young people from Essex and Norfolk who are members of Sea-Change’s Youth Sailing Scheme, their places having been sponsored by charities and other organisations.
In Norwich, during the evening of Wednesday 13th August the barge will host a session of ‘Flying Folk’, the traditional music and singing group that usually meets each month in pubs around the county – especially appropriate as a previous owner/skipper of Cambria, Bob Roberts was a traditional singer and musician of note.
On 13th August Cambria will be joined at her mooring near Carrow Bridge, Norwich by Norfolk Wherry Trust’s ‘Albion’ – The last engineless coastal sailing barge meets the last engineless trading wherry in the Port of Norwich! Surely a notable occasion in the maritime heritage of Nelson’s County!”

Exciting stuff – good luck with that you Sea Change-ers!