Wednesday 11/5/11 to Tuesday 24/5/11 Including an Underwater Inspection of Hull!!

We stayed put today and got the bike out. Also found out that we had another funeral to attend in Reading and Margaret’s ear op had been booked for 21^st June, so B & B has been arranged at Amy’s. Thursday we were back at Guildford and took in an Alan Ayckbourne play at the Yvonne Arnaud theatre, v/g. Friday we ended up cycling to RHS Wisley. Quite good but pleased we didn’t have to pay as we had borrowed a card from my Uncles daughter in law. We also passed a little boat yard and for the benefit of Dragonfly and Lady G I bought myself a ‘Brolly Mate’. A T shaped bracket that slips over the tiller to hold the brolly over the helmsman when he’s steering in the rain. It wouldn’t work for the ladies as I have noticed that they don’t do steering in the rain. By Saturday lunch time we were sitting outside the Anchor at Pyrford just having lunch when DISASTER STRUCK. I need to set the scene….In order to facilitate the comfort of the crew when cruising it had been decided that a pair of chairs (the stacking type you see in schools and church halls, with all in one seat and back and metal legs) would be fitted, minus their legs, to the wooden stool type arrangement at the stern that we currently have. The said chairs had been spotted languishing and unwanted at the back of the N.T. workshop at Dapdune Wharf Guildford. For the princely donation of £5 to the N.T. coffers a pair had been procured. Yours truly made short work of dispatching the legs and fitting one to the driving position. It functioned just as a chair should, to make a more comfortable helming experience. By the time we reached the Anchor the passenger seat had also been fitted.

So there we were basking in the sunshine consuming our lunch time snack eased down with pint of Tangle Foot, with Mrs Helmsman sitting on my seat and me sitting on her seat next to the bank…..now that can’t be right.

As an aside there was a little tale on the side of the glass which I shall quote “ Many years ago the head brewer hosted a tasting to coin a name for his new ale. Several tankards were consumed and on rising to go he experienced a sudden loss of steering and so unwittingly fell on the perfect name for his legendary ale”

With just paperback in hand rather than plate and pint, the wooden stool bit fixed to the top of the metal upstands quite happily for the last 12 years decided to part company with the metal. The chair was only fixed very firmly to the wooden bit. Without any warning I executed a perfect back flip (no twist) into the canal. Chair and book both floated but I sank, the metal lining of the canalside removed a fairly large portion of skin from my head with a glancing blow, luckily, but I don’t really know what I hit my knees on but they both collided with something. With great restraint Mrs Helmsman assisted me to a somewhat soggy seated position on the edge of the canal, trainer shod feet dangling in the water. On looking later at the space between boat and metal edge I consider myself lucky to have escaped so lightly. As I sit here a week later the head and knees are pretty much back to normal. ‘No need of a trip to Norfolk Liz’. The fairly new iphone in the pocket may not have faired so well, although functioning at the moment the prognosis is failure eventually.

To the captains of Lady G and Dragonfly I say ….I can’t wait to hear how you may fall in!!

We spent M’s birthday on Sunday 15^th at CoxesMill just on the River Wey near the Thames, and had a Thai mealat lunch time in a nearby pub, in case the threatened evening rain happened. By Wednesday with the funeral behind us we left the Wey at midday and went back on to the Thames. Thursday we went to Hampton Court Palace, v/g, and by Friday afternoon we were queuing at Teddington Lock waiting for high tide and the 3 ½ hour run through London to Limehouse Dock Marina. All went well and we even arrived about ¼ hr early, the only tricky bits were identifying the entrance before we past it and getting in without getting swept into the starboard wall. The options were to hang a left and go straight in, taking account of the back eddy (who ever he is) or zoom past (the ebb tide was going at a rate of knots by then) and turn back and enter on a right hand at a more controlled speed against the flow, if we had enough engine power to overcome the flow. A guy at the other end says he always go straight in as its quite hard to turn in the flow so on arrival with the flow not looking too bad (so I thought) I went straight in. It was quite nerve wracking deliberately heading for a very large wall to the left of the entrance at speed (essential) trusting that the good old tide would ensure that I missed it. In the event I could have done with a quite a few more feet to the left as I only just missed being slammed into the far wall then almost hit the near wall in my efforts to avoid the far wall. The degree of lean that Sammy Jo developed was quite alarming, (Graham you would have been proud of me and all without a sail or keel) We had travelled down with the tideway with another novice and as we levelled out in the relative safety of the lock cut I saw him suddenly abort the intended left turn to follow me as he obviously wasn’t going to make it and he hastily signalled that he was going to turn. He pootled in a few minutes later in a very controlled manner but did afterwards say that he thought he was not going to make it against the flow and feared ending up out to sea. Today..Saturday we did a lovely walk all round the docklands unfortunately not the Docklands Museum as they wouldn’t let Charlie in. We continued a little further and then moored up just past the entrance to the Hertford Union canal, and our intended route to the Lee & Stort, some where near Victoria Park and Bethnal Green. On Sunday we moved on into London a bit more and walked into Camden Locks and the market, it was heaving. Monday we decided against staying and going to a show so we set off towards the Lee & Stort as the next part of our journey. Had to cope with a broken alternator belt and needed the bike to go in search of a new one despite having 5 spares on board as they none of them were the right size. Tuesday 24^th still on the Lee but not too impressed with it so far.