SwanR

If I was ever solo, even on the Broads, I would be asking the boatyard to moor me up on the end of a quay, plug me into the electric and just spend a week watching everyone go by!!

Great write up Helen. Even with having to wait for February you're going to be afloat before me!! We usually get out in October but are giving that a miss this year. So hoping for March ... perhaps. :)

So a slight aside, but I have looked from time to time at the canals but not had the confidence to want to book anything. Is the Lancaster canal enough to do a few days holiday? Lock free cruising is what I would be looking for.

Those photos certainly tell a story. It was almost unbelievable how the weather changed. September certainly felt like it brought autumn along sooner than other years. Already got the heating on in the house every day now.

I vaguely considered trying to book something for next week myself, just for a short break. But nothing much came up. So either it's going to be incredibly busy out there or not all the boats are being used at the moment.

I'll have you know that my folder of photos of Broadland pubs is coming along nicely! Problem is that when I'm posting from my phone I haven't got access to it!! Haven't set foot in most of the pubs either, at least not to consume alcohol, but then the rules don't say you have to have had a drink there.

I didn’t know about the change to 100 either.

It's an interesting one. I work in customer service and transferring a service desk of somewhere around 100 people to a home working situation was tricky. For a start more than 50% of those in the office were still on desktop computers not laptops and these could not be taken home as they're not encrypted and we handle confidential data. And then there's the issue of how you manage inbound and outbound calls when you're not in the office. Only about three or four of us have a company mobile so something called a soft phone option needed to be found. But none of this happened overnight. Our IT team did an amazing job and we soon got laptops rebuilt and issued to everyone and our incoming call lines back open but not at full capacity. Once that was sorted out we still had to get a large number of people able to make calls out to customers ... and that has only recently been resolved so everyone now has that capacity with 30% of the team able to work back in the office. If we get locked down and they get sent home then this may all change again. Yes we have a business continuity plan but it didn't cover this scenario!

This continues to be a great write-up with some very atmospheric photos of those misty grey mornings. I always find it interesting that the bridges into Norwich aren't mentioned on the list of those where you need to be careful. Not sure why as your tale clearly shows that it's somewhere else that you might not always get under on a fly bridge cruiser.

Continues to be a very interesting account of your recent time on MS, Helen. Sounds like Graham made good time to MK and back. We have become a little more cautious again recently about where we go. Life has lost much of its spontaneity right now with having to plan and book to do things.

Great write up and photos Helen. Love those early mornings on the Waveney. Haven’t spent the night at PH yet and am always paranoid about getting turned round before HWs yard when we’re only cruising with no intention to moor, which is most times. And Seren is still adorable!

Hope you can get everything sorted out. That’s a very difficult position to be in. We moved house at the start of September and were fortunate to slot in that gap when the housing market was allowed to wake up and when local lockdowns and further restrictions started to bite.

Wow! Not an enjoyable cruise at all then. That was certainly a horrible 48 hours of weather last weekend. Glad you made it safely back to base. Sometimes you just have to do the sensible thing.

There’s a number of places where we’ve moored but not stayed overnight. And there’s a number where we’ve never moored. Ludham Bridge was great when we stopped there in March a few years ago with only one other boat there all night. Sutton is another one we like. As you say, still places to tick off the list.

You have indeed been picking some of my favourite places. Fleet Dyke and Paddy's Lane are places we love to moor too. I also like to be first away from the moorings in the morning if I can. Don't always make it but it's the best time for cruising.

Wow! I really need to start walking more to get out and about round these kind of places. The year we moored at North Cove I wanted to do Beccles as well. It sometimes feels like a waste to slog down the New Cut and the more tidal area of the Waveney only to go all the way back the next day. So we went from North Cove back up to Oulton Broad and then back down to Beccles. Made a nice cruise. :)

Ah it is indeed a grey chilly day here in Norfolk. I'm sure you must be glad to be home. I can imagine that lovely as it is to be away, you were ready to get back to Cornwall. Thanks for sharing your travels with us. Look forward to the next time. :)

Always good to direct those kinds of questions to the boatyard to be sure.

I would agree with that and add Well Deck Diaries to your list. They also release a vlog on Friday evenings. And there is a channel called Walk With Me Tim. He has been posting weekly vlogs travelling around east coast seaside places. So if you want a look at some of the areas in driving distance of the Broads it’s worth a watch.

We had a night there in March 2019 with no-one else there at all, we had it all to ourselves. Amazing. Quiet and sheltered and we could hear the owls in the trees.

Days of doing not a lot sums up the Broads completely. We love Womack and are always torn between the Dyke and the Staithe. Love the peace of the Dyke but I struggle with side on moorings when the river levels are high. Womack Water is wonderful if you go out of season and avoid having to play sardines with everyone else.

That poses an interesting question and I do feel for you and so many like you. I would see if the yard would move the booking again now to secure my favourite boat. That’s if the yard will do it with still three weeks to go. Tempting as it would be to wait, what are the chances of things turning round and restrictions easing that soon. I do think that restricting travel from lockdown areas, as the Welsh government have done, is actually the right thing to do.

Great start to your tale Helen. Interesting to see that you had a view right across to Lowestoft. Worlingham and North Cove are a nice change to mooring overnight at Beccles.

I’ve bought books of photos of the Broads and I reckon that your photos are right up there with them. But how anyone gets into something like that I’ve no idea. Perhaps I should see if there is a local photographic group up here.

More amazing photos Malcolm. A new career? It was such a shame about the weather. Helen and I had hoped to meet up too while they were on the northern rivers but it wasn’t to be. As for the Greys or Ken’s debate, I have always favoured Greys but we had cod and chips from there last week but it seemed to have lost something. Will be trying Ken’s next time round to see.