The Victorious is once again sailing the coastal waters of Norfolk, exactly a century after she was first launched.
The shrimping smack, built in King’s Lynn 100 years ago to fish the shallow waters and tidal creeks of north west Norfolk was discovered three years ago by Henry Chamberlain.
‘I found her on a mooring in Cornwall, all but abandoned. Her stern was completely rotten and her deck was also rotten, but she was a Norfolk boat and needed saving,’ said Henry, who, returning from a career in peace-keeping and humanitarian missions, launched a business specialising in sustainable sailing adventures around the Norfolk coast
The Victorious is the latest addition to his fleet of restored traditional Norfolk boats.
'She will be working hard demonstrating that sail power is still just as relevant as when she was built,’ said Henry, of the Coastal Exploration Company, based in Wells-next-the-sea.
‘We think she has a new and very important role to play in Norfolk’s maritime future - her hull was designed to work the shallow draft east coast powered only by the wind, what could be better for sustainable transport in the forthcoming years?
‘We are not looking to preserve an old boat for the sake of it, but to use her unique design to help solve environmental challenges for our future, sailing cargo along the north Norfolk coast and beyond.’
The Victorious was built, for shrimping and cockling, at the famous Worfolk boatyard, for fisherman Harry Cook. Crews would sail out into the Wash on an ebbing tide, ground the boat on a sandbank and rake cockles from the mud until the water washed in again to carry their harvest back to Lynn.
A century on she joins Henry’s fleet of traditional Norfolk wooden boats including a terracotta-sailed whelk boat built in King’s Lynn in the 1950s, a Sheringham crabbing boat, a Brancaster mussel boat and a punt built for wild-fowling.
They tack out to sea or slip through shallow channels into a hidden landscape of reed, marsh and tiny sandy bays, with cargos of local produce, or with passengers treated to creek-swimming, wildlife-watching, food-foraging, nights under the stars rocked to sleep by the ebb and flow of the tide, or chef-cooked gourmet meals of local produce, enjoyed in the landscape where it was grown or made.
The Victorious take people sailing in the Wash or along Norfolk’s chalk reef and carry cargos of coffee which has been shipped across the Atlantic from Colombia in a schooner, to be roasted in Lynn and then sailed to Wells.
Henry is now searching for a permanent berth for his rediscovered and restored Norfolk treasure, where people can visit her, enjoy a coffee, find out about Norfolk’s martime history and, said Henry, ‘Build a community that loves what we do.
‘It could be from Kings Lynn to Great Yarmouth but she should really be in the Purfleet, by the Customs House - can anybody help?’
From war zones to Wells-next-the-sea
Henry Chamberlain monitored battle-ravaged mountain borders by ski and crossed African conflict zones by camel. He survived a carjacking and suicide bombing in Sudan, took scientists to the Arctic and found routes to get food to famine victims.
Henry, who grew up in a cottage on the Houghton estate and now lives near Fakenham, fell in love with outdoors adventures as a child.
A career with the Royal Marines and the United Nations took him to some of the most beautiful and dangerous places on earth.
After learning to sail at Burnham Overy his passion for the sea inspired him to join the Royal Marines. For seven years he travelled the world as a soldier and sailor, becoming expert in survival skills, before returning to university for a masters degree in water engineering and development. An interlude running a jazz club in the Caribbean was followed by posts with international, inter-governmental organisations.
He helped monitor the dangerous mountain border between Chechnya and Georgia, and between the north and south of Sudan, before the formation of South Sudan. Working with a medic and a translator, his job was to bring rebel and government leaders together. In Somalia he helped get overseas aid to starving civilians, becoming deputy director of field security for the United Nations World Food Programme.
Eventually he returned to Norfolk, needing to spend more time with his young family, and launched the Coastal Exploration Company.
His expeditions today are more peaceful , sailing traditional wooden sailing boats through the shifting channels and creeks of the north Norfolk coast. The Coastal Exploration Company was launched ... but every journey is still an adventure and the Coastal Exploration Company
coastalexplorationcompany.co.uk
