The water babbles like a room of people

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jan/03/water-babbles-like-room-of-people

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We head out for a walk-cum-paddle across Coggeshall's flooded countryside. Our route starts on the pot-holed path alongside the St Nicholas' Chapel, and most of what remains of the town's abbey. A lichen-flecked sign says we're on the Essex Way, and we follow the Harwich direction. It's a mild day, but the rain of the season has taken its toll on the fields.

We pass through the 16th-century farmyard built among the abbey's ruins, and out to the former fish pond, which is presently aiming for lake status. Murky water surges under a small bridge, as well as covering much of the land, forming streams and rivulets. The earth has been heavily churned by horses and out on the raised land ahead we're observed closely by one in a winter jacket. The water babbles like a room of people, but I can still make out the trills of long-tailed tits as they dip from tree to tree, unfazed by the flood. I start to adjust to my new pace: taking a tentative step before waiting a second or so to see how much I slip.

We're greeted by the land's owner, out for a walk with a wiry jack russell. He tells us the flooding is subsiding but warns us about the path ahead and kindly offers us the use of some private routes. I see what he means: where the river Blackwater splits into two, our slim route of grass path is often submerged by fast-flowing water, and at several points I have to leap over these gracelessly into my partner's outstretched arms.

Often the relief of this makes me careless, and I repeatedly lose my footing on the damp banks, before reaching Pointwell Mill, which signifies the return to road. Overhead the sun appears faintly, as if through tissue paper, and herring gulls crisscross delightedly over the sudden wetlands.