Boating along the River Tweed

Jamie Davies has explored the Tweed extensively for the Inland Waterways Association. This account was originally written for the IWA's Scottish newsletter, Lochs & Locks, and is reproduced here with his kind permission.

Scotland’s second-most southerly river navigation is also England’s most northerly; it is one of the most beautiful rivers in either country, but is surprisingly neglected by mainstream waterway magazines.

The Tweed, which is navigable by typical ‘inland’ craft from Tweedmouth in Northumberland, to an island near Fishwick Mains in the Borders region, and for shallow-draft boats to the weir at Norham. The total distance is about ten miles, most of which are precisely along the national border. Cruising the Tweed can provide an enjoyable day or two of exploration for owners of trailable craft and an interesting diversion for vessels in transit between the main Scottish and English inland systems, for which Tweedmouth is a useful stop-over anyway. These notes are intended to assist navigators of the Tweed and to point out features of interest. While they are written in good faith, from notes taken while cruising the river in September 2004, neither the author nor IWA can take responsibility for anything that arises from their use: skippers have to make their own judgements and decisions.

Getting your boat to the Tweed

There are two ways for a boat to arrive on the Tweed; by sea and by road. The entrance to Tweedmouth from the sea is covered by admiralty charts 111, 160 and 1612, Imray C24, and also by a chartlet in Reed’s (p404 of the 2004 edition). The complete length of the navigable section is shown on OS landranger map 75. The entrance is accessible from two hours before high water to one hour after, but it is easiest around high water itself because strong flood tides will pull you Southwards across the entrance while the combination of an onshore wind and strong ebb creates chaotic seas over the bar, of the kind that really do not suit inland craft. The channel is marked well by buoys and leading lights, but the sands at the entrance shift so care is needed. Leisure craft can wait in Tweed Dock, which has a reasonable range of facilities, before setting off upriver. From the point of view of trailboats, there are two useful slipways, one large one at Tweedmouth (near Tweed Dock) and a small one, very useful for dinghies, on the South bank between Berwick Bridge (the old road bridge) and the newer road bridge just upstream. I would not try taking a car down the smaller slipway, though!

Navigating the Tweed

A journey along the Tweed is best begun from Berwick a little before high water, so that you can ride the tide up the river and still be travelling through the water fast enough to have steerage way. Leaving too early has the disadvantage that there will not be enough water in the river, and the tide will be running fast enough to sweep you on to shallows. Leaving too late risks a pointless battle against the ebb and running out of water higher up the river. As always, when exploring an unfamiliar tidal river, it is safest to travel before spring tides rather than afterwards, so that if you do run badly aground the next tide will be high enough to lift you off again. The Tweed, though, is affected by rainfall, and it is also safest to avoid the river after periods of sustained rain in the lowland hills, partly because the temporary rise in river level may let you across a bar you cannot subsequently re-cross when the rain has drained, and partly because of the strong currents that the rain brings. The river provides enough depth for narrow-boats, but this depth is often confined to a relatively narrow channel so opportunities to turn are restricted, and are made more challenging by the presence of a current that seems intent on setting craft towards the nearest sandbank. Craft longer than about thirty feet may be difficult to turn beyond Horncliffe.

A journey along the river begins with Berwick on Tweed itself, an ancient fortified town that has a long history of being fought over by the English and Scots. Its walls are largely intact, and the river provides a good view of the oldest parts of the town, including the quaint old road bridge, now one-way. This bridge is the most serious limitation to air draft on the navigation. Narrow-boats and the like will be able to slip underneath with no trouble. Taller craft may have to go under the bridge early and then wait beyond for the water to catch up, but be careful if passing the bridge long before slack water, because the flood runs so fast through the arches that the water has a noticeable slope (I have not tried this!). The more modern bridge has a much more generous air draught, but it aligns awkwardly with its predecessor and the river made shallow by a large mud-bank near the Southern bridge support. This may be a nuisance to people using the small slipway on this side. Beyond the road bridges is the magnificent viaduct of Stephenson’s Royal Border Bridge, which carries the East Coast Main Line high over the river. Choose an arch about a third of the way out from the northern bank of the river, because the water is very shallow on the southern side and what appearsto be a widening of the Tweed on that side actually leads to a swamp called Yarrow Slake. I suspect that getting stuck in the Slake would not be any fun.

Beyond the railway bridge, the river broadens and becomes locally much more shallow; in general, the Tweed follows the rules of thumb that narrow=deep and broad=shallow, and that the deep water is to be found on the outside of bends, quite well although there are some exceptions as mentioned below. The bottom here is weedy and stony but the water is clear, so that the bottom is at least visible without the need for sonar; but if your boat does happen to be equipped with forward-looking sonar, so much the better. The deepest water, only about four to five feet at normal summer levels, is to be found a little North of centre, as would be expected from the gentle curve in the river at this point. The beauty of the river becomes apparent even this early in the journey, with a wooded northern bank leading up towards the remains of Berwick castle, and a marsh land full of wading birds to the South.

The river deepens again as Berwick is left behind, and begins to bend the other way, through low meadows that will be familiar to anyone who travels either the A1 or railway. The graceful high bridge of the A1 provides one of the few indications that the Tweed above Berwick is still regarded as a proper navigation - port and starboard channel markers and suspended below its deck and were lit when I passed, so are obviously properly maintained. The markers make it clear that the southern arch is the one that contains the navigation channel. Only a few feet upstream of the bridge is the confluence with the river Whiteadder: I have no idea whether this is navigable for any distance, but the OS map suggests that finding a place to turn may be a problem.

The river becomes shallow again at West Ord, the shallows continuing as far as the second of the power cables that pass overhead. Two small islands add interest to the northern bank along the long straight reach of river (leave them to starboard), and towards the end of the reach there is a traditional fishery. Fishermen row nets out from a slip on the northern bank, rowing in a curve so that the net forms a loop that extends to a little further than midstream. An ancient winch on the bank then hauls in the net, the fishermen looking out for any salmon trapped therein; each cast of the net tends to catch about 1-5 salmon. The fishermen sell these fish and make a living from them, so please take particular care not to disturb them, and obviously never steer between one of their boats and the northen bank! When I passed, they seemed genuinely pleased to see a visiting boat on the river, and gave very cheery waves!

More or less at the fishery, the northern bank becomes Scottish, and from here the national boundary runs directly along the centre of the river, so that you can cruise between England and Scotland, and back, with a twitch of the tiller. The Scottish bank steepens quickly as the river bends to the left, with Paxton house perched high above the river. The valley narrows rapidly, and at its narrowest point it passes beneath the historic Union bridge. This bridge is the oldest working suspension bridge in the UK, and is still open to normal road traffic. I have once crossed it by car and enjoyed the experience, because it sways so noticeably that you can feel that you are on a suspended deck. Going underneath, and looking up, I ‘discovered’ that the deck itself consists of some very mouldy looking wooden planks: I’m not sure I will enjoy driving across it quite so much now!

Beyond the Union bridge, the Scottish and English banks have quite different characters. After a short distance of steep woods, the English side flattens out into wide meadows that provide grazing for sheep and cattle border the river with soft beaches of sandy mud that provide easy landing for a tender. The Scottish bank, on the other hand, remains high and aloof, presenting rugged stone cliffs to the river and, of more importance to the navigator, presenting a shelf of solid rock that extends about a third of the way into the river. I would not like to hit this even with a steel hull, and would be very wary of it in wood or plastic. Fortunately, the water is clear so the shelf is easily seen. It is typical of the luck that accompanies inland navigation that I met the only boat I had to pass - a small motor cruiser - exactly in the middle of this length of narrow channel.

The English village of Horncliffe, which has a pleasant pub, is perched high above the river so that it is almost invisible from it until you have already passed and are looking back. Some local sailing boats are moored here, and it is fairly easy to land. About a quarter of a mile above Horncliffe, near the end of the road at Fishwick mains, the river divides again to pass around an island. At normal summer levels, this is the end of the navigation for all but the shallowest craft, because the upstream end of the channels around the island becomes very shallow and rocky, ‘shallow’ meaning a depth of only one to two feet. This is true of both channels. Horncliffe provides good holding for an anchor, though, so that a mother craft can be left here and her tender used to explore the rest of the river. Floods will open the river to larger vessels, but will also bring much stronger currents, so if you are trying this dodge, be very careful.

I found rowing a small tender past the island to be good exercise, the speed of the water at the shallows giving the rower the feeling of trying to run up a down escalator. If you time your passage better than I did, you may get some help from the tide. Beyond the island, the channel deepens again, but it is hemmed in by fishing weirs that project diagonally about half way across the river, first from one side and then the other. These cause a local acceleration of current, and some more good exercise for the rower. A couple of miles further on lies Norham, which is an interesting large village with a castle and, alas, an impassable weir. For normal boats, this really is the end of the line although canoes can, of course, continue far into the lowland hills.

The journey back down the river is similar to the journey up, although it provides a new perspective on the scenery. As with any other tidal river, though, downstream travel brings an additional problem of timing because riding an ebbing tide downstream is not simply the reverse of riding a flood tide upstream. The problem is that, by the time high water reaches Horncliffe, the ebb will have already set in down at Berwick so the water there will be falling. If your boat is shallow enough and fast enough, set off while the tide is still rising and punch the flood to reach Berwick while there is still a lots of water over the shallows by the viaduct. If you cannot do this, it would be better to take two tides for the journey than to risk running your bow aground with the strengthening ebb pushing at your stern, especially in an easily-rolled craft such as a narrow-boat. Apologies if you feel that I am insulting your intelligence for spelling this out, but a surprising number of people, including some well-known salt-water narrowboaters, have been caught out by the asymmetry of upstream and downstream travel on tidal rivers. Take care, and the Tweed should give you a very enjoyable cruise!

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