contentedsouls

All locked out and hurting.

Before we left the Cape of Good Hope we got chatting to a couple with a beautiful dog – actually, we got chatting to the dog and then the people said they thought they knew us; but not the boat we were on. They remembered us from way back when, when we had been into their boatyard to get Matilda Rose’s engine mounts fixed which had sheared off. In an attempt to save us money, they had fitted us with alternative – cheaper – mounts than the ridiculously over-priced Vetus mounts. Unfortunately Matilda Rose didn’t appreciate our budget measures; vibrating her socks off and shivering Daisy’s food off of the work surface and opening all the cupboard doors and drawers. We were forced to return to Sarah and Gary at Lyons boatyard and refit with the original Vetus parts. It cost them money as their engineer, David, had to remove and replace the old ones and we only paid for the difference in the spare parts. They remembered us – get this – because we didn’t get angry and gave them good reviews for their service. A lovely catch up and big hugs from Sarah before we left them. Brilliant.

Meanwhile, back at our very tight mooring, Daisy introduced us to our ‘overlapping’ neighbours who, fortunately, are avid cat owners and lovers; Graham (I know, they get everywhere these Grahams) and Jan. We agreed in principle to do the Hatton 21 the next morning but we couldn’t commit to a time as toilet emptying had now become our highest priority. We phoned the Saltisford Arm boatyard and they advised us to reverse in for a pump out. G reversed her in perfectly and pump out achieved for a mere £15. Job done, we headed to the bottom of the Hatton flight to find our lock buddies just tucking themselves in and ready for us to join them. Unfortunately their Graham wasn’t well and my G was suffering from sciatica so Jan and I had a bit of a workout ahead of us with every lock against us.

Just over halfway up we encountered a volunteer lockie which allowed Jan or I to go ahead and set the next lock; 3 people makes such a difference. Hard work, but the fun company of Jan made the time fly by although it was the slowest time we had taken to do this flight; it didn’t matter – we were in no rush and we did it at a comfortable speed, rewarding ourselves with toasties and bacon butties, respectively, with icecreams all round to follow.

En route we encountered the most extraordinary couple coming down. He was on his own on a shortish boat and wouldn’t come out until our pair had left the lock below him; but, as a pair, there was nowhere for them to go unless he came out and pulled over to the side. Eventually he did, with great reluctance. I stayed back to close a gate for him and he then pulled out ramming the concrete adjacent to the entrance to the lock and ending up sideways across the gates, so I asked his lady lockwheeler if she would like me to leave both gates open. It took awhile before she could be persuaded to peel her earphones out of her lug’oles, so I repeated the question. Her response was, “whatever” (it’s the first time anyone has actually said that to me and I had a job to supress my giggles). I pointed out that I really did need to know if she wanted me to close the off-side gate or not. Her response was, “don’t care, whatever makes you happiest”. So I left ‘Mr and Mrs we’ve clearly had a row and would rather be anywhere else on this planet than doing the Hatton together’ to it – later finding out that Jan had had a similarly stimulating conversation with her at the lock above!!!!

We moored overnight on the embankment at one of our favourite spots and spent a leisurely day there before moving the tiny hop to the Tom O’ The Woods pub to pick up my friend Wendy for a sleepover additional crew to do the Knowle locks. For reference, the pub has been refurbished and is delightfully dog friendly.

All 3 of us were wacked, so it was an early night after a thrown together pasta supper. Wendy never changes (nor would I want her to) and she didn’t disappoint when she finished off the left-over cold pasta for breakfast in the morning – she is renowned for it.

We had not done the Knowle locks before (previously going the Lapworth route) and they were really pretty; despite a dull and chilly start to the day. Wendy, an avid gardener, had to be recalled at one point having spotted the lovely lock side border.

Shortly afterwards we reached the point where we had agreed to leave Indigo Dream and G drove Wendy back to her car. I know we didn’t have much time together but, that we did have, was very precious time.

So that was it for us; Just the packing and cleaning to do. The plan (yeah, I know. The ‘p’ word again) was to finish off everything we needed to do by around mid-day the following day, have lunch in the pub and sleep in the afternoon before leaving about 10pm to catch the 4am ferry from Dover. Around 12 ish on the Thursday we were just about done and G came up with a much betterer plan; so we skipped lunch and sleeping and headed off to Cookham to scrounge dinner off of say goodbye to Sue and Vic and the girls. The nearest point to their mooring that we could park the van was quite a walk for Baxter, but he managed it – just – in his own time and was very pleased to reach Penny’s new bed. Muttley was off like a rocket as soon as he spotted NoProblemXL.

Leaving them at 9.30 we were in time to catch the 2.00am ferry and we were very glad we had upgraded to the Premier lounge as the ferry was rammed with 500 teenage passengers from 10 unexpected coaches (due to a problem on another Company’s crossings). I must admit to travelling with some trepidation as my Dutch friend, Gezina, had forewarned me that Francoise was in, ‘a bit of a mess’. I certainly wasn’t prepared for the ‘essence of unloved boat’ that assaulted my nostrils as we opened the doors.