Comments on: At Canvey Island

By: Ian Johnson

Ian Johnson — Sun, 07 Sep 2025 21:09:01 +0000

I very much enjoyed reading this account of a day trip to Canvey, surely one of the quirkiest places in England, with much still to recommend it. However may I make one correction? I was brought up in South Benfleet, and I never heard the tidal waterway that separates Canvey from the mainland called anything else but “Benfleet Creek”. I know that old maps have sometimes labelled it “Hadleigh Ray”, but nowadays that is the name of the channel which remains at low tide, several miles down river, and a mile or so off Leigh-on-Sea and the Southend foreshore.

By: Roderick Oakley

Roderick Oakley — Sun, 07 Sep 2025 11:25:55 +0000

Very enjoyable reading. My friends and I would ride our bikes down to Canvey Island for a day visit during the early 50s. Journeying from Bow, East London. Aged about 12 or so. Quite a ride with the return trip on sometimes unsuitable bikes.
Later during working years in the 60s, I would sometimes be on a Thames lighter, or tug alongside the oil jetty at Hole Haven, with the Lobster Smack pub just ashore over the sea wall. In 1972, married with children, we moved to Canvey, our kids grew up playing in fields and open spaces, and attending modern schools.
So different to my growing up playing on bomb sites and war damaged houses. Still living on Canvey Island today. Some 50 odd years now. A lot of the open spaces have been built upon, but there is still plenty of open recreational areas.
So, no regrets.

By: Marcia Howard

Marcia Howard — Sat, 06 Sep 2025 16:24:24 +0000

The grandmother of my ‘bestie’ from senior school once lived in the most deprived part of Bermondsey. In her latter years, she moved to Canvey Island and lived there until the end of her days. It seemed such an idyllic place.

By: Tony Wetjen

Tony Wetjen — Sat, 06 Sep 2025 11:58:53 +0000

Amazing, my grandfather was an East End Boy and may well have visited Canvey Island.
Unfortunately, grandfather died when I was quite young, so I didn’t get the chance to ask
him about his youth in Whitechapel and trips to Essex! However, I did manage to check
out Southend whilst in my teens!

By: Bernie

Bernie — Sat, 06 Sep 2025 07:51:02 +0000

Ah me! So many missed opportunities! But one cannot do everything!

As a youth and teenager in North London Canvey was one of the many places I heard of from schoolfellows and local pals but never set out to visit. I don’t know why! But somehow what I heard wasn’t enough to persuade me to splurge my meagre pocket-money on this, rather than some other outing. Now, almost eighty years later, I can only hope that the balance I chose was right.

By: Lorraine

Lorraine — Sat, 06 Sep 2025 07:30:41 +0000

Some of the best times of my childhood were spent on Canvey with my extended family, all of us escaping the daily grind of Stepney. 4 generations of us regularly made the journey, starting around the 1910s/20s and ending with us in the 60s. However, these days I’m back there regularly again because of my nostalgic tendencies now I am old. Setting foot on the island prompts memories and emotions to wash over me. We had the best childhood. There’s nothing like a short stroll along the wall followed by a super lunch in the Lobster Smack, a centuries old inn on the waterline looking over the estuary. Or maybe a wander along the seafront across from the Monico pub where as children we enjoyed the delights of the long row of amusement arcades and snack bars. Yes, those days are long gone but it’s still there both in the air around me and in my heart.