Thanks for posting the song, Richard. Was it written by Bob Roberts?

Wikipedia says the Nore is a sandbank at the mouth of the Thames Estuary, England. It marks the point where the River Thames meets the North Sea, roughly halfway between Havengore Creek in Essex and Warden Point on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent.

I can imagine it would be a treacherous spot for ships. There's an interesting watercolor of the lightship at the aNational Maritime Museum, and there's a photo of a more recent lightship in the Wikipedia article. I saw a very similar lightship on one of my trips to the UK, but I didn't get a photo of it.

-Joe-