The oyster beds and sandy beaches of Britain’s most easterly inhabited island have been attracting visitors for centuries. Mersea is just a few miles south of Colchester, once Camulodunum – capital of Roman Britain – and there are Roman remains among the island’s layers of history. Bus 86 arrives from Colchester every hour, crossing a causeway called the Strood, which is often covered by water for an hour or so at high tide. But Mersea feels even more like an island if you arrive by boat, so I’m starting from Brightlingsea (bus 87 from Colchester), where a summer ferry crosses to wild East Mersea. Here the River Colne and the wide Blackwater estuary meet the tea-grey sea and strange bones emerge from crumbling cliffs.
