A Thames Sailing Barge has moored a little way off the island. This is not an uncommon sight, and it is a sight that I always find moving and gratifying – for the simple reason that I spent some formative years living on one, moored some eight miles up river from here. My father told me that for a long time it was the most efficient method of transport, as the barge could be sailed by one man and a boy, and the tonnage carried was very impressive. You could say that it had an outstandingly good EROEI.

In the background, in case I haven’t mentioned it before, is Bradwell Nuclear Power Station, now being decommissioned. I think that nuclear power in some form does have a future, but not the way originally planned. Quite a contrast to ponder. The technological future recedes into the past, the tried and tested come back to life.