Mersea Island

Mersea Island is a tidal island in the estuaries of the Blackwater and Colne rivers in Essex, about 14 kilometres south of Colchester. It covers some 4,450 acres and is home to around 7,000 people, most of them in the town of West Mersea. Joined to the mainland by the Strood, an ancient causeway that floods at the highest tides, it is the most easterly inhabited island in the United Kingdom. Mersea is famous for its oysters, its sailing and its beach huts, and for its quiet saltmarshes full of birds.

Its name comes from the Old English meresig, ‘island of the pool’, so ‘Mersea Island’ says ‘island’ twice.

Landscape

The island is divided between West Mersea, with its houses, harbour, jetty and seafront, and East Mersea, which is mostly farmland. The south coast faces the Blackwater estuary, with long beaches that dry out at low tide and, across the water, the former Bradwell nuclear power station. To the north and west the island is cut off by the Pyefleet and Strood channels, bordered by wide saltmarshes and mudflats, part of a protected estuary that is internationally important for wintering wildfowl and waders. The cliffs at East Mersea yield fossils from the Ice Age, including the bones of animals such as hippopotamus that once roamed the area.

History

People lived on Mersea before the Romans, and the ‘red hills’ of burnt earth left by their salt making can still be found. In Roman times the island seems to have been a favourite retreat for wealthy families from Camulodunum, now Colchester, and the Mersea Barrow, a large Roman burial mound in East Mersea, contained a lead casket with cremated remains. Oysters have been harvested here since at least Roman times, and the trade remains central to the island’s identity.

The church of St Peter and St Paul in West Mersea stands on the site of a seventh-century church, and St Edmund’s in East Mersea dates from the twelfth or thirteenth century. With its creeks and marshes, the island was a haven for smugglers from the sixteenth to the nineteenth century. In both World Wars it guarded the approaches to the Colne and Blackwater, and pillboxes and observation posts still dot the shore; one has been turned into a beach café.

Mersea Week, held every August, is one of the oldest sailing regattas on the east coast.

Places to visit

West Mersea’s waterfront, with its fishing boats, oyster sheds and seafood restaurants, is the heart of the island, and the ‘Old City’ area around the harbour keeps a cluster of historic weatherboarded buildings. The Mersea Museum tells the story of the island’s fishing, sailing and people. The beach and its brightly painted huts stretch along the south coast. At the eastern end, Cudmore Grove Country Park has a sandy beach, grassland, cliffs and a sea wall, with fine views of the Colne estuary and its birdlife. Mersea Week, held every August, is one of the oldest sailing regattas on the east coast.

Getting there and around

The B1025 crosses the Strood causeway from the mainland, but at the highest spring tides the road can be covered by the sea for an hour or so, so it is worth checking tide times before travelling. Buses run regularly between Mersea and Colchester, which has the nearest railway station. In summer, a small foot ferry links Mersea with Brightlingsea and Point Clear across the Colne.

Island life

Farming, fishing, oyster farming, boatyards and tourism are the island’s main businesses, and its six caravan and camping parks fill up in summer. The Colchester oyster fishery, still opened each September by the Mayor of Colchester, has a history going back centuries, and the creeks around Mersea remain one of the country’s best-known oyster grounds. In winter, the marshes are home to thousands of brent geese and wading birds.

Wildlife

Among the wildlife most often recorded on Mersea Island are Adder, Green Woodpecker, Marsh Harrier, Brent Goose, Slow Worm and Jay. See the Wildlife tab for the full list of 129 species and when to see them.