The Eddie

IMG_3146 (2).JPG

On most of the world's river's the changing of the tide is hardly noticed. The transition from ebb to flood and back again is gentle and often slow, rising only a few feet and then slowly draining away again.

However, when some of natures parameters line up, a small list of river's around the world experience a powerful phenomenon when the tide floods in.

This rare occurrence is known as a tidal bore and is when the incoming flow of water forms an edge that can be witnessed as a continuous, vigorous wave travelling up the river.

IMG_E1248 (1).JPG

I've lived next to the River Dee in North Wales all of my life and I have seen it's tidal bore, known locally as 'the Eddie', less than ten times.

So you can imagine my excitement, when pedalling my bike along the river path I turned around to see old Eddie roaring up behind me!

I instantly took a video on my mobile as I was riding, emphasising on the 'man vs nature' theme by panning the camera from the bore to my handlebars and back again, implying a nail-biting race to the finish. So please excuse the quality of the next image. It was a screen grab from the video and it's purpose is only to show the breaking of the bore as it travels up river.

Screenshot (6).png

The bore was now ahead of me after slowing down to film it and as a footbridge appeared in the distance, my inner child took over and I pedalled like a maniac to beat it to the bridge that was about a mile away.

I wasn't the only one who had accepted the throwing down of nature's gauntlet. A man in his fifties flew past me on his racer, greeting me as he took pole position for the best spec on the bridge.

Don't tell the viewers of my white-knuckle ride video but in reality Eddie is pretty cumbersome as he rumbles up the river and I reached the middle footbridge with a minute or so to spare before the first wave passed under.

Screenshot (13).png

The white, foamy surf had now disappeared and it seemed to have more of a bulge and power about it as it neared the bridge, flipping rocks on the water edge and sending birds flying away.

The guy that had beat me to the bridge had since got bored of waiting and continued on, allowing me to unleash my inner geek and marvel at the power of mother nature passing right beneath my feet.

Screenshot (12).png

The initial bore is then followed by many more ripple like waves called whelps. It was the power of these whelps that seemed to completely transform the river from mill pond like stillness to the choppiness of a bad day at sea.

Rocks crashed together on the waters edge and a boat, tethered to the underside of the bridge clanged away continuously as the now irregular waves crashed in all directions.

Screenshot (5).png

The footbridge I was stood on is regarded as the best place to view the Dee bore. It peaks here before petering out after passing through Chester. It's common to see people sitting in the water on kayaks, waiting for Eddie to thrust them over the border into England.

No kayaks today but I could see why they do. In the minutes following the first wave passing under me, the water just became more and more violent and this was only a small one!

Screenshot (7).png

Screenshot (8).png

As the whelps toned down their freakish behaviour, the spectacle came to an end with some huge clouds of silt and mud, dragged up from the river bed, staining the already murky water.

Screenshot (11).png

The Dee tidal bore appears only a few times during the year and it is believed there has to be a ten meter tide in Liverpool for it to take place.

Scientific research was carried out on a number of river's around the world, including the Dee and the power of the bore's they studied threw many challenges to their measurements as if almost alien.

In less than an hour though, all calm is restored, the birds return and the mill pond like surface takes shape again like it never happened.

IMG_E3957.JPG

Have you ever witnessed a tidal bore or other type of Earth movement? Let me know.

Thanks for reading and have a great weekend.

Sort:  

Congratulations @x-53degreesnorth! You have completed the following achievement on the Steem blockchain and have been rewarded with new badge(s) :

You received more than 7000 upvotes. Your next target is to reach 8000 upvotes.

You can view your badges on your Steem Board and compare to others on the Steem Ranking
If you no longer want to receive notifications, reply to this comment with the word STOP

Vote for @Steemitboard as a witness to get one more award and increased upvotes!

Hi @x-53degreesnorth, your post has been reviewed by the TravelFeed content team, but due to the volume of high-quality posts, your post does not qualify for an upvote. If you post your next post through TravelFeed.io, you a guaranteed an upvote as long as you don't violate our content policies.

We noticed that you used the tag #travelfeed. With Steem moving to communities, we are retiring #travelfeed and will stop curating the tag with the launch of TravelFeed 3.0 in early March. You can learn more in our community announcement post. For your posts to be eligible for curation, we recommend you publish them through our platform TravelFeed.io. You can simply log in with your existing Steem account using Steemconnect or Steem Keychain.

PS: You can now search for your travels on-the-go with our Android App. Download it on Google Play

Great post. I was up in your neck of the woods not to long ago. I’ve been looking at purchasing woodland in Wales over the past year as I love areas like Snowdonia and Pembrokeshire. Wales as a whole is just a beautiful place. Thanks for the post, definitely enjoyed the read, and keep on Steeming. :)

According to the Bible, Bro. Eli Soriano: The Marks and Proofs of a Blessed Reader

Watch the Video below to know the Answer...

(Sorry for sending this comment. We are not looking for our self profit, our intentions is to preach the words of God in any means possible.)


Comment what you understand of our Youtube Video to receive our full votes. We have 30,000 #SteemPower. It's our little way to Thank you, our beloved friend.
Check our Discord Chat
Join our Official Community: https://steemit.com/created/hive-182074