Yup, I wasn't too sure what mudlarking was either, till Clare G suggested booking it. After a rather handy cuppa at the Salvation Army headquarters nearby (who knew?), it turned out to be a 40 minute chat by a young archaeologist, outdoors by the Millennium Bridge, showing and describing a range of the historical artefacts that are dredged up by the tide each day.
And then an hour and a half of me, Clare & Janine bent double in our wellies and waterproof gloves, trawling along the tidal edge and up by the river walls, picking up whatever bits of interesting stuff we could find!
Actually, really surprising how much there was – lots of pieces of broken pottery and ceramics, and my 2 favourite sets of items, any blue pottery and the bits of old pipes – white sections with a hole up the middle, of which there were literally hundreds! The green and yellow one top left of the photo was Medieval apparently (hopefully not just some broken old Toby Jug that had been dumped in the river from a traditional pub!)
Sadly none of the 'once in ten years' type of thing, but still, enough to easily fill a nice sunny October morning, and a dog poo bag with finds..
All topped off by a nice tapas lunch with J at Brindisa in Borough Market (poor Clare had to leg it back to work), girls making the most of being 'aaht, up town' x