Final preparations are being made for the 2022 Sailing Coble Festival which will take place at Bridlington over the weekend of 23 – 24 July.
The last few details are now being put together for what is promising to be a fantastic event based around the town’s picturesque harbour.
Organisers are hopeful there will be 16 historic and heritage vessels taking part in what is becoming recognised as a major maritime attraction on the East Yorkshire Coast.
The Festival has not been staged for two years due to the Covid pandemic and lock-down restrictions but this year it is back, bigger and better than ever. The response from vessel owners wishing to attend, and those keen to take up the opportunity of a stand within the harbourside Vessel Maintenance Facility (VMF) at Clough Hole, has been overwhelming.
The owner of a Yorkshire built traditional double-ended beach boat from Portknockie, on Scotland’s Moray Firth, has confirmed he will be attending the Festival. Two sailing cobles from North Yorkshire will also be taking part, Grace from Staithes and Julie B from Scarborough. The delightful 26 foot transom stern keelboat Granby will be making the passage down the coast from Newcastle upon Tyne once again. Built in 1983 at Kirkcudbright, she has been a regular visitor since 2016 when the first Festival took place.
A partly built 19 foot foy coble will be displayed in the VMF by Sunderland Maritime Heritage to show the skills of boatbuilding are still alive. Once completed this coble is bound for New Zealand. One of the leading marine paint manufacturers, Teal & Mackerill Ltd of Hull, will have an interesting display that will include the famous Flamborough Orange, a colour used by many generations of Flamborough fishermen for painting the inside of their cobles. There will be the opportunity to see the unique way in which the traditional fishermen’s guernsey is knitted and a display of patterns.
Two sailing cobles making their first appearance at the Festival will be Kathleen and Venus, both having been completely restored by the Bridlington Sailing Coble Preservation Society (BSCPS) over the past two years. Kathleen was built at Seahouses, Northumberland, in 1949 and is now owned by local members of the Society. The more recently restored Venus, originally built in 1900 as a Hartlepool pilot coble, is thought to be the oldest surviving coble on the north east coast. She was one of many that worked from Hartlepool, Redcar and Seaton Carew taking pilots out to ships heading for the Tees and guiding them safely into port. The restoration work on both cobles has been undertaken by local retired coble builder John Clarkson and a team of volunteers. Venus will be officially named and re-launched, with the customary bottle of champagne being poured over her bows, on the Saturday before the Festival gets started.
Spider T, one of only three surviving Humber Sloops on the National Register of Historic Vessels, will be part of this year’s event. The 62 foot iron-hulled vessel was built in 1926 at the Warren’s Shipyard, New Holland, for Captain Tomlinson of Thorne. She worked between the Humber ports and the inland waterways of the Trent and the Ouse carrying cargo such as coal, bricks and cement.
The Festival will get underway at 9.30 am each day and there will be a great opportunity to see the various vessels moored alongside Harbour Road, near the Harbour Heritage Museum, before they head out for sailing. The North Pier will offer a fantastic vantage point for those wishing to get photographs. Music and sea songs will be performed by Jim Eldon (The Brid Fiddler) on the harbourside near to the Museum and he will be the compère throughout the Festival. Those who know of Jim will be familiar with his repertoire of songs gathered from East Yorkshire fishermen. The Harbour Museum will also be open for the duration of the Festival with free admission.
The chance to see traditional sailing vessels in and around Bridlington harbour will bring back to life faded images of long ago when sail power was in its heyday. Cobles were a familiar sight at every port, harbour and coastal village from the Humber to the Tweed with these iconic craft being the mainstay of the inshore fishing industry.
The sailing coble revival, especially at Bridlington, has created a new lease of life for many cobles destined for the scrap heap. Bridlington is ‘the sailing coble capital of Great Britain’.
