While in Hull for the Association of Lighthouse Keepers AGM weekend at the end of last month, it was the perfect opportunity to improve upon my previous efforts to visit the lights along the south bank of the Humber Estuary and the River Ouse. I’ll be honest, it wasn’t a day I was excited about, mainly because our first stop was Killingholme and I didn’t enjoy my last visit there.

I did try to approach it with a more positive view that perhaps I had just been tired that day or maybe it was the stress of constantly feeling like I was getting lost at roundabouts that made me enjoy it less. I was willing to give it another try. Almost immediately after arriving in the area I was reminded of the smell and then we encountered the approach road to the lighthouses and the feelings began to return again. Bob had remained positive about it until this point, but he’d not been there before. He was just enjoying all of the industrial scenery around, it seemed. When we reached the end of the road and arrived at the first of the three lighthouses I knew exactly why I didn’t enjoy the place.

The lighthouse next to the road is looking even worse than it did seven years ago and has even more damaged cars surrounding it. I’ve looked into the lighthouses here over the past year and found this website. It is the comments further down the page that tell of happier (and not so happy) times at the lighthouses there. There’s also an interesting explanation as to why the North Low light might be falling into disrepair. It sort of makes me more intrigued by the lights, but I’d read this before I went recently and I couldn’t get past the feeling of the place.

Not hanging around for too long, off we went and the next priority was for Bob to go up a quick hill, not that there was much “up” involved. I waited in the car as I often do on these occasions.

The next stop was Whitgift, where I’d only seen the lighthouse from the road on my last visit. This time we walked right up to it. It’s quite a nice tower and much better maintained than some of the other smaller lights we’d seen. I don’t have a huge amount to say about it to be honest. I’m glad I’ve been closer to it now.

Now the next one I do have a bit more to say about and that’s the old River Ouse Apex light. I had seen this one through the fence back in 2012 and I’d also stopped at the nearby Yorkshire Riverways Museum in Goole, which had a nice cafe. On the way there this time though I discovered that the Museum actually closed earlier this year, which was a shame. We decided to still drive along though so Bob could see it, and I’m so glad we did. When we arrived the gate to the area the lighthouse is in was wide open, and who can resist an open gate when there is a lighthouse on the other side? We went in, but didn’t expect to stay long in case someone turned up and shouted at us.

We’d been there a few minutes when a car drove in through the gate, the driver got out and it looked like he was locking the gate behind him. I mean, I love a lighthouse, but I didn’t fancy being locked in a compound with one! We spoke to the man and it turned out he wasn’t locking the gate, he had just closed it and was off to play guitar with a friend in the little building there. Phew, we weren’t in trouble! He said it was fine for us to wander around so we returned to the lighthouse feeling considerably more relaxed and taking a bit more time to check it out. Considering it’s no longer in use and not even in its original location it looks a lot better than some of the other active lights in the area. It’s a really interesting tower and I was so pleased we arrived when we did so we could get a much closer look.

The final stop of the day as we continued our journey north was Teesport. This area is not an easy one to find a lighthouse in as it is rather industrial. Thankfully through the research I carried out for my book, it was simple enough to find. There’s no public access to the tower itself, but we could see it through a fence. It’s a fairly understated and functional tower as you would expect in such an area.

We spotted the rear light (which is incredibly tall) as we drove along the road on the approach to the lighthouse. It’s a long way back from the front light, hence the need for it to be as tall as it is. We didn’t linger here for too long as we felt that we were probably being watched by a number of security cameras and personnel, so we got some pictures and off we went, noticing the security car hanging around close by as we drove off. Clearly they aren’t used to lighthouse enthusiasts in Teesport!

A good lighthouse day, even if it wasn’t the most inspiring. When you do these things you need to accept that there will be some good days and some not so good days. Although this particular Sunday hadn’t been so enjoyable, the following day was to balance it out perfectly. More on than very soon! 🙂