Piercabulary: 50 new words inspired by standing at the end of Erith Town Pier
anglerwharf: an industrial jetty mostly repurposed for fishing bexleyness: a feeling of liminal isolation boredwalk: not the most exciting promenade buoyholes: gaps where lifebelts used to be before they were vandalised chunkybench: form of 90s civic street furniture designed for resilience rather than aesthetic value cityblock: not being able to see the skyscrapers in the heart of the city because they're all hidden, for example behind silos, cranes and a large incinerator dampladder: a set of precipitous rungs exposed twice a day deadplaque: a few words inscribed in memory of someone who loved this spot, for example Dad who did all his fishing here doombeach: an expanse of tidal sludge, inaccessible except to birdlife erithgrey: a shade of bleached beige
exbuffer: the end of a disused railway featurebelt: on a dull day in a tidal estuary the thin horizontal strip of interest between grey skies and grey waters floodsteps: annoying up-and-over staircase installed for the sole purpose of keeping out water levels that hardly ever happen foiledtree: a sapling that's attempted to grow somewhere unwelcoming so won't be getting any bigger, for example at the tip of a pier gallowbeacon: a form of navigational signal where access to the upper light is via a cylindrical ladder that unfortunately resembles a gibbet greyspan: an almost entirely colourless panorama grimsquint: realising you can see something unpleasant in the distance, for example Purfleet gullstellation: a group of white seabirds bobbing in formation on the waves jettyenvy: wishing you were walking down Erith's narrow wooden causeway instead lewdscrawl: adolescent graffiti comprising musings on sexuality and line drawings of genitalia
lonesitter: someone who locates a bench in a deliberately isolated location and lingers there lorrycade: a steady stream of trucks, for example serving a distant freight depot muckscaping: the reshaping of landfill into scenic heaps for future leisure use mudlapping: the unattractive alternative to waves on sand murkwater: an uninviting brown shade of sediment in an estuary openbreeze: wind that's noticeably stronger once you get away from all obstructions, for example at the tip of a pier pillarweed: a form of seaweed capable of clinging to the concrete supports of a pier pylonmarch: the thin strip within which electricity is carried across a landscape ripplewash: a brief period of heavy wavefall after a large seagoing vessel has passed by rustfloat: a Thames barge that'll never sail again
scrapclaw: the chief tool at a breakers yard (see also scraphammer) seatrekker: a cargo ship with a long voyage ahead shoreflats: 20th century apartments built to take advantage of an estuary view, even when such view is drably underwhelming shoreflatsplus: premium apartments built to take advantage of an estuary view, none of which exist in Erith slateocumulus: a particularly grey type of cloud sludgegullies: shifting muddy creeks revealed at low tide sololunch: taking one's sandwiches as far away from one's colleagues as possible to enjoy half an hour of peace squawkonautics: aerial display by noisy seagulls starebackers: people who look back at you looking them, for example when stood at the tip of a pier throughtrain: a rail service you can see passing but cannot board anywhere in the vicinity
tipregret: a feeling of disappointment on walking all the way to end of something only to wonder why you did tollspan: river crossing requiring a fee to be paid, for example the Queen Elizabeth Bridge trolleyooze: mud from which a supermarket shopping cart will never be recovered unattraction: something which could draw in tourists but doesn't, for example the longest pier in London untidybin: litter receptacle whose top has blown off and/or whose bag is missing upandback: constitutional walk to the end of something and back purely for the sake of a bit of exercise uptide: incoming waters (see also downtide) wastescape: estuarine panorama that's almost entirely devoted to recycling, scrappage and landfill whirlbine: three-bladed windmill for the generation of electricity yachtflock: group of sailing vessels moored offshore from a marina
