I took a bike ride south four miles along along the Gloucester--Sharpness canal to Sharpness, where the canal meets the Severn River. It was a sunny, windy Sunday and sections of the canal were a sea of flower petals. Mallard hens were out with their ducklings.
There were people out picnicking, fishing, walking and kayaking along the canal. In the village of Purton I stopped to look around and saw this beautiful church, Saint John the Evangelist.
On a bend in the river there are the hulls of several old ships that were purposefully wrecked along the river bank to help prevent erosion of the riverbank.
I passed the abutments for an old railroad bridge made out of stone blocks. They looked like ancient turrets emerging from the trees.
The canal ends of the Port of Sharpness. The difference between the canal and river level at low tide is astonishing. One of the reasons the Severn estuary supports such huge numbers of wintering birds is that it has the second greatest tidal range in the world, second to the Bay of Fundy. At low tide this exposes extensive areas of tidal flats for birds to feed on.
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note the level of the canal even with the top of the fence line
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To the south is the bridge that spans the estuary separating England from Wales.
From the Port of Sharpness I looped around and headed back.
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