YnysMon

I hadn't realised you were a poet Griff. That was one massively engaging and heartfelt post. I don't think I've read anything that comes close to it in conveying such a sense of what it must be like to serve on board one of Her Majesty's ships (now his Majesty of course).

Doesn’t sound like the Chinese economy is doing particularly well currently. They appear to have a private housing crisis.

It’s a bit too early in my book too, though I’m sure that when I get back to brass band rehearsals after a few weeks away we’ll be rehearsing the Christmas music. Same with the choir. We’ve had a fortnight’s break from the choir after a concert, and all our rehearsals from next week will be for our Christmas Carol concert.

This forum was my lifeline when my Mam was slowly leaving us in 2017. In some ways a sudden departure is more merciful, but whatever the circumstances it’s not easy for those of us left behind. My condolences to Smoggy and Simon.

It’s a shame I missed Arthur’s Welsh quiz, it might have been the only quiz I did well on…ever. I’m rubbish at quizzes but had been contemplating joining in, but have now ruled myself out by joining a band that rehearses Friday evenings. Hey ho.

We hired Bronze Emblem the year before we bought into a syndicate. We found it a lovely responsive boat, and none the worse for not having bow thrusters. It handled really well.

Congrats! I like to think we aren’t snobby on this forum and love tales from other waterways. I do anyway.

Sorry about you loss Smoggy. It must be heartbreaking sorting through everything. I’m just glad my Mam allowed us to do that when she was still with us, after she had decided she couldn’t cope and had moved in with us. I’m still in awe that she did that. We brought her most treasured possessions to our house (china mostly) and rearranged our house to accommodate them, but mostly she just left everything else behind, and allowed us to sell her much loved home once she recognised she wouldn’t be returning to independent life. That’s completely the opposite of what we are currently experiencing with Graham’s Dad, where he’s clinging on to his independence, though past being able to cope.

Nice hint. No, I’m not taking a wallpaper steamer to Anglesey.

On a lighter note...

A bit difficult, I only got round to reading the comments this evening and we are travelling home tomorrow. Dad hasn’t got a hairdryer anyway. At least I managed to clear the majority of the ice without damaging anything. I think the fridge is faulty, as it’s on the minimum setting. We have had an ‘interesting’ few days. When we arrived on Tuesday, intending to stay with Graham’s dad, we found the kitchen taken over by millions of flies (well, maybe thousands.). Some investigation unearthed a few uneaten, defrosted meals that were being consumed by maggots and, in a cardboard box, underneath more cardboard I found a mass of mouldy chips. I won’t go on about the state of the rest of the kitchen, but I’m sure you get my drift. There wasn’t anything in the fridge, but there were some odd items like salad leaves in the freezer. We rolled our sleeves up and tried to tackle the worst…me in the kitchen and Graham the bathroom, but the more I unearthed, the more worried I got. I phoned Dad’s social worker, telling her we were at our wit’s end. She was very helpful and suggested that she find him a room in a care home for him temporarily whilst his house gets sorted and he gets assessed. She visited this morning and we are just waiting to hear whether he has accommodation somewhere. Meanwhile the house still needs a lot of ‘tackling’, and there’s only so much you can do in a few days. Needless to say, we didn’t stay in Dad’s home. We ended up in a Travelodge…luckily they are dog friendly. The poor dogs have spent a lot of time in the car the last few days, though we have taken them for beach walks each day.

Like the people who think their holiday is ruined because they couldn’t moor outside a pub every evening. Okay, slight exaggeration, but I have seen reviews that aren’t far off that,

Wow, that's amazing Kate. I've always wanted to visit Poland. We are up in Anglesey. Unfortunately not enjoying the walking etc. I spent most of today trying to defrost Graham's Dad's freezer aided by a hammer and chisel. That's a first, but I thought drastic action was required as the amount of ice build up was almost preventing the door being closed. He relies on delivered frozen meals quite heavily, so that was a priority.

Yes it was. I’m not sure the trip we’ll be taking to Anglesey tomorrow to see Graham’s Dad will be quite so relaxing.

Ooh, and I forgot to say that we were very pleasantly surprised by our fuel bill. We only used 53 litres, which is a lot less than our previous trips, despite crossing Breydon at rather higher revs than we normally do and having a few long cruising days. We are putting it down to the new prop. I noticed that we need less revs generally. In fact, it's quite difficult to stay within a 3mph speed limit even at tick-over.

Friday 13th October The usual boring morning of packing up and cleaning the boat. We were on a deadline this time, as I’d arranged with Malcolm (Mouldy) that we would meet up at noon on MS with the lady who has been commissioned to do our cabin reupholstery and new curtains. Malcolm brought Graham (and the boat) a present. Malcolm and I both liked one of the grey shades in the sample bolt that she had with her... but we thought we would pull Warren’s leg by sending him a picture of the blue swatch (Warren keeps complaining that we tend to go for blue all the time). We agreed to meet up with the lady again in November, when Graham and I are next on board, by when she hoped to have some more fabric samples available. After saying farewell to Malcolm, Graham and I started off home but had a detour for lunch at The White Horse, Upton. I wasn’t that hungry and just had the soup of the day (spiced carrot and lentil - nice but a bit salty for my taste). Graham opted for a vegetarian sausage baguette, which was very good value considering it came with a good helping of chips and salad. It was after 2.30 by the time we got on our way again. Although the traffic was reasonable, with no hold-ups, once we left Norwich behind the rain set in and the visibility was awful for the rest of the journey. On the Bedford bypass there was a lot of standing water, so all in all, not a great journey. We got home before six though, which was fairly good considering. Next trip starts 10th November, so not too long to wait!

Thursday 12th October I woke early this morning, but even so we didn’t get away early. We hung around hoping that the boat moored opposite to us would leave first, but once 10am went past we decided we couldn’t wait any longer. We asked a liveaboard chap if we could move his second boat, that was immediately behind us in the dyke, up a bit to give us a bit more room to manoeuvre, and he helpfully came around to move it himself. I’m glad we left when we did, as we passed three largish Richo’s boats once we turned down Limekiln Dyke, so it might have been a bit more tricky getting past them in Neatishead dyke. In future I must remember not to try to find a mooring on the upper reaches of the Ant on a Thursday. Judging by the number of Richo’s boats we passed as we made our way down the Ant, a lot of people were trying to find a good spot overnight before handing their boat back on a Friday morning. The same thing probably happens on a Friday too. Crossing Barton Broad. We had decided to stop at How Hill for a proper dog walk (run), and the straight stretch of moorings was clear when we arrived. By the time we got back from our walk a lot of other boats had arrived! We could have done a longer walk if we had gone on the path that runs south toward Ludham Bridge. However, as we were moored on the upper end of the moorings we turned north and followed the path that goes past the old wooden mills. When we got to the lane that runs to Johnny Crowe’s Staithe we turned right (away from the staithe) and were surprised how far it took us. We turned off the lane and followed a footpath sign that took us behind this cottage. We could have gone farther, but the footpath that we took looked like it was going toward a group of houses = road. Anyone know what this wooden structure is for? Returning down the lane and across the bridge that runs across a creek. Once back on the boat we set off for ‘home’ ( our mooring in Horning). I'm glad we were turning upriver when we got to Ant Mouth. The area around St Benet's looked a bit chaotic! When we had got beyond Ludham Bridge I phoned Boulter’s and we went there for our re-fuel and pump-out before returning to our mooring. Boulter's basin was even tighter than usual, and that's saying something! I had checked out the weather forecast for Friday morning and didn’t fancy moving the boat around to Boulter’s in the 40mph+ gusty winds that were forecast. It meant we had to use the Marina ‘facilities’ for the rest of the day and Friday morning, which was slightly inconvenient, especially as we had to put wellies on for each trip (the area in front of the sheds in the Marina tends to be awash when river levels are high). Much the better option than manoeuvring the boat in strong winds though. By the time we got ‘home’ it was well after 2pm, and we still hadn’t had lunch. A visit to Latham’s was on the cards for the afternoon, as we’d agreed with fellow shareholders that we would replace any of the pillows that looked worn or stained, so we had a mind to get a late lunch at The Falgate on our way to Latham’s. Guess what – our luck in eating out this trip was continuing. By the time we got to The Falgate it was after 3pm and they weren’t serving food between 3 and 4pm. We got back in the car and parked behind Latham’s where we also were unlucky with pillows. They only had two in stock, and we needed eight! Every cloud has a silver lining though. Back at the boat I dug out from the fridge some leftover pesto pasta, roasted veg, and half a baked potato all of which got reheated in the microwave and served with the rest of our houmous and olives, so it was just as well that we couldn’t eat out. Graham cleaned the exterior of the boat before sunset, using a caravan cleaning solution. Seemed to do the trick at getting rid of impeding patina. ()

Wednesday 11th October Another lazy start to the day. There was quite a lot of interesting activity this morning, with a boat lift going on both in the Marina and in the Boulter's yard just beyond. As forecast, the sky was pretty gloomy and we had a shower of rain as we were starting off. However, the rain didn’t last long and even though it stayed overcast it was pretty warm. We turned up the Ant and had a lovely gentle cruise, though this thick smoke drifting across the river just above How Hill was alarming. We had a slow cruise up to Neatishead where we bagged what we though was one of the last few spaces down the far end, though shortly after we made space for another late comer. We went to The White Horse for lunch, intending to have a fairly light lunch and then have something more substantial in the evening. Graham got tempted by their veggie burger though, which came with a generous portion of chips, so he was fairly stuffed after that. Once the dogs had stretched their legs (unfortunately not off a lead) we returned to the boat and had a very lazy time for the rest of the day. We didn’t want much for our supper, so I put some part-baked rolls in the oven and we had those with houmous, olives and cheese. We managed to catch the programme about Norfolk and Suffolk that was on Channel 5 this evening. Quite interesting, but we switched the sound off each time the adverts came on, and why do they keep repeating things. It’s like after each set of adverts they have to summarise what they’ve covered so far, as if they think people can’t remember what came before. Drives me nuts!

Tuesday 10th October We had been intending to go to Norwich today and then return north tomorrow, but there wasn’t anything we really wanted in Norwich, and I would been tempted to visit the fabric shop (and have too much fabric already), so we decided to return north today. Besides, the weather forecast for today was for another beautiful day, whereas tomorrow was forecast to be rainy. We didn’t set out from Rockland until after 10. We were passing through Reedham late morning when we spotted the three ‘Lads Week’ boats again, moored up not that far from The Lord Nelson. Everyone waved madly. We continued on our way as far as Polkey’s Mill, where we moored up for a dog walk and lunch. The dog walk wasn’t ideal as we kept the dogs on a lead due to the warning sign about sheep. A few bends in the path later we spotted the sheep, so we turned around and walked the dogs back to the boat. Lunch was a quick ‘pasta with pesto’. Whilst I was preparing it we were alarmed to see a largish hire boat come in to moor just in front of us with the tide behind him. Having struggled to moor using his bow thrusters, he decided to leave - bow first naturally - and as he did so gave Moonlight Shadow an almighty whack with his stern. There was a horrible crunching sound, but fortunately, MS seems to have survived, apart from a few marks. We were a bit shaken up by that, but luckily the next couple of boats that came into moor were more sensible, or experienced (or both). After we’d had our lunch and were biding our time before setting off for Breydon, the three Lads Week boats passed us. They later posted that they had a particular destination in mind for this evening, so were in more of a hurry than we were. Even so, we were against the tide for most of our passage and on the journey up the Bure, presumably because the Aweigh App was showing that low tide was about an hour later than originally forecast. Graham took over the helm as we crossed Breydon as I wanted to see how well my new phone and new camera lens coped with taking photos of the wildlife. The phone wins hands down. It has several lenses, including a x4 one, which combined with digital zoom seemed to work really well. I probably didn't need to buy the camera lens. Hey ho. Camera Phone We didn’t push too hard against the tide, but still managed to get as far as our home mooring at Horning about half an hour after sunset, when there was plenty of light left in the sky. As we had our canopy down (which meant the forward nav light on the roof wasn't connected), Graham strapped a torch on the roof instead. Isn’t it amazing that we were able to comfortably cruise with our canopy down past sunset in October. The last couple of days really have been exceptionally sunny and warm, and even the evenings and night times have been mild. Once we were secure on our mooring, we popped in the car to Roy’s to get a few bits and pieces, including bread and some bacon. Graham had a hankering for shortbread and spent ages in the biscuit aisle looking for some. Eventually we worked out that all the shortbread had been moved to the seasonal ‘Christmas’ aisle. We also bought ourselves a couple of ready meals to reheat once we were back on the boat, as it had been a fairly long day.

Monday 9th October This morning’s weather forecast was promising, and it certainly turned out to be a perfect summer’s day - remarkable for October. It was beautifully warm, but not too hot. We got away from Beccles mid-morning and had a gentle pootle down the Waveney as far as North Cove, where we moored up to take the dogs for a walk. We took the path that runs toward the Waveney ferry crossing, but didn’t go that far. We were out about an hour and the dogs had a wonderful time running off the lead. We are learning more on this trip about good mooring places for the dogs, as we prefer, if we can, to take them on a walk where they can (mostly) run freely. Once back on the boat we got on our way again, again taking things easy as we weren’t in a hurry. Normally, I prefer to time our transit through the New Cut for around about low water, but low water wasn’t until later in the afternoon today, so we just turned up the Yare and plugged against the tide. Graham started sanding down and then varnishing another section of the wooden trim in the galley. This was his solution to keeping dog hair off his tacky varnish. As I said, we weren’t in a hurry. We thought we’d try for a spot at Rockland St Mary, but if there wasn’t room there were plenty of other options open to us. Hardley Mill was getting a bit of 'titivation'. As it was, there were only three boats already at Rockland, and another arrived shortly after us, which left room for a couple more. We thought we’d have an early dinner at The New Inn, but it turned out they aren’t currently serving food on a Monday evening. Foiled again! We are not having much luck with eating out on this trip. Anyway, we had plenty of food on board, including a steak that I’d bought yesterday, so I had that whilst Graham had some veggie sausages which we had with baked potatoes and broccoli. A quiet evening followed as usual, though we did watch the telly for a change.

Sunday 8th October We didn’t get up early this morning, despite going to bed ridiculously early. The dogs woke us at 7 but settled down again when told to. When we did get up and take the blinds down, I could see the Peto’s Marsh pontoon mooring was unoccupied, so we slipped across the river to bagsy that. This mooring was catching more of the sun than the mooring we had left and was nicely positioned to watch passing paddleboarders, rowers and other craft, as well as an otter that swam up quite close to the front of the boat. After a bit of lazing about and breakfast we took the dogs out for a walk. This didn’t go quite as planned. If you turn left from the mooring, you come across a choice between turning left toward Oulton Broad or right toward the Waveney River Centre ferry landing. The path toward Waveney is raised on a dyke, but we didn’t get far along it before we disturbed a hare. Pozzick almost dragged me down the bank in pursuit of it and kept pulling in that direction. Then we startled another hare. That set Pozzick off even more. The walk was turning into a battle between me and Pozzie, so we turned back toward the boat. I can see why they insist you keep your dog on a lead on the Carton Marshes! Given the dogs hadn’t had that much of a walk, we upended our plans that involved staying on the Peto’s Marsh mooring until after lunch, and then catching the incoming tide toward Beccles. Instead, we did our engine checks and started off just before 11am and chugged along gently against the tide up to Beccles, arriving there early afternoon. We had a sandwich lunch on the way. We were disappointed when we got to Beccles to find that the electric card that we had previously used, which still had some credit on it, no longer worked. They’ve changed their system again and have a very limited number of cards, so there's no way you can hang on to a card for those occasions when you might arrive after the office is closed. However, they told me that they are willing to put credit on a post for you if you phone them earlier in the day. Anyway, for this trip there was plenty of credit on the post near us, so we didn’t need to purchase extra, so that was something. I doubt that we used much overnight anyway, as it’s still remarkably warm. I briefly used the microwave and charged up my iPad, but that was about it. After we had sorted ourselves out, plugged in etc. I walked up to the town to get a few bits and pieces. Not that we needed much. A new Puzzler mag for me, some more washing up liquid, some croissants from Lidl for the morning. The rest of the afternoon was spent with the canopy down enjoying a summer-like afternoon. Late afternoon we took the dogs for a run along the path that runs past the sailing club. I’m not sure if it’s my imagination, but Pozzie does seem to be very attracted/curious about live-aboard boats. I still wonder how his earlier life went. I’m sure he wasn’t mistreated and was very much loved (apart from somehow ending up abandoned), as he’s so trusting and gentle in nature. I was very lazy this evening, and reheated an almost identical meal to yesterday, as we had roasted veg left over, a sachet of rice, more houmous and some coconut yogurt. Different to the vegetarian haggis meal I had planned, but it felt too summer-like for that option. We had another evening of not doing very much at all, and an early night.

Saturday 7th October The alarm was set for 6.30 this morning, as we wanted to start off at dawn. The idea was to find somewhere further down the Bure where we could let the dogs stretch their legs before the Lads Week flotilla passed us on their way down to Gt Yarmouth. I’d been in touch with Griff beforehand and he had let me know that they were planning to leave Ranworth around 8am. There was a space at St Benet’s, but rather than disturb the boats that were already there we continued on downriver. We passed Luna Aurora, moored at Boundary Farm moorings, and Sam spotted us going past as she walked Desmond and later messaged me to wish us a good day. The Broads Bank moorings at Acle were virtually empty, so we stopped there. The quay heading is in a dreadful state though, with the wooden boards there that should have been attached to the metal piling either missing or half hanging off in some places. Several of the wooden posts were very wobbly too. Anyhow, it sufficed for a short stop. Luna Aurora passed us heading downstream, and we exchanged waves this time. Griff was sending me the occasional WhatsApp message to let us know their progress, so we waited about 10 -15 minutes after they’d passed Thurne mouth before casting off and then we lurked about at tick-over until we spotted them just upstream of the Acle bend. We tucked ourselves at the end of the convoy. After that it was an uneventful run down to Yarmouth, taking it easy. We passed Luna Aurora again, moored at Stokesby; thanks for posting the photos Sam. When were passing under the Breydon road bridge it looked like the tide was still flowing out quite strongly, so we were pushing against the tide most of our way across Breydon. It was fun to be crossing in the company of others and we managed to do the first section four abreast as there ware hardly any other boats around. It was certainly a faster crossing than Graham and I normally do! At the end of Breydon we waved farewell to Grendel, who was standing at the stern of Broad Ambition, and turned to port to go up the Waveney. We stopped at Burgh Castle moorings to let the dogs run around for a short time and then we had lunch before we continuing our journey. The Waveney was exceptionally quiet, even by usual standards. Shortly after leaving Burgh Castle I tried phoning to book a table for Sunday lunch at The Copper Smokehouse at Oulton Broad. However, they had an out of office message saying they were closed for staff holidays. Drat and double drat! I googled to check out alternatives, but the Duke’s Head Somerlayton had a really weird sounding vegetarian option, the Bell at St Olaves didn’t seem to have any vegetarian option at all (some places seem to think it’s okay to just offer vegetarians the accompanying vegetables, and for the same price as the meat option!), and other places didn’t appear to be dog friendly. Even so, we considered stopping at St Olaves and again at Somerlayton, as there was space near the electric on both moorings, but as the weather was so mild, we didn’t need electric, so we continued on to the Dutch Tea Gardens moorings at Oulton Dyke, where there was plenty of space, both on the normal mooring or the pontoon. We found these to be an excellent mooring choice for the dogs as there are several paths from the mooring, one of which has a sign saying 1½ miles to Oulton Broad for shops etc. We went in the opposite direction along the path that skirts the dyke. It was fairly wide initially, but got narrower once the last few fishing platforms were left behind. We enjoyed the walk, but the dogs seemed to be quite concerned about their paws when we returned to the boat, licking, and nibbling them, probably due to the nettles on the narrower sections of the path. Oulton Dyke was mostly peaceful, with only a few craft going to-and-fro. After sunset it was completely peaceful, although when I took Seren out after dark I was surprised to see a boat manoeuvring in the middle of the dyke near us. They had no nav lights, but had left their rear cabin lights on. Hmm. They were keeping their revs down though, and found a space to moor up at the far end of the moorings from us. We had a fairly early supper of roasted veg (aubergine, courgette, onion, red pepper) with a sachet of Persian style quinoa and lentils, with some houmous on the side. It’s the first time Graham and I have been on board since we had a new cooker installed, and it’s a big improvement. We had a quiet night reading before having an early night.

Watched a few months ago, as it popped up on my ‘feed’. Absolutely delightful. Like you I thought it a bit strange that they went south on a short break, but why not!

To be continued... I'm a bit short on time for the next few days.

Trip 15 - 6th to 13th October 2013 Friday 6th We got away mid-morning and had a fairly stress-free journey to Norfolk, stopping at La Hogue Farm Shop Café for lunch. We both seem to be settling into a routine of getting the same lunch each time we go there: Graham likes their vegetarian field mushroom and halloumi burger and I like their hummus platter, with salad, pitta and olives, especially as they change up the home-made hummus that comes with it. We thought this barn on the property had interesting beams. Only visible if you go to their overflow car park. It was getting on for 1.30 by the time we got to the outskirts of Norwich, and we aren’t supposed to pick up the boat until late afternoon, rather than go to do our usual shop at the Lidl near the Postwick interchange, and then the Thorpe Sainsbury’s, we carried along the A47 up to Acle and then turned off to the road that goes through Filby and leads to Caister-on-Sea. We parked near the Lifeboat Station. They have a new café but that was closed today. Parking was free, as the parking charge is suspended from the end of September to April or May. The dogs had a lovely run along the beach. Seren kept dropping her ball near the tide line, so that needed to be kept an eye on. After our walk I did our initial shop in the Caister Lidl before getting other bits and pieces in the Caister Tesco. By the time we drove to Horning Pleasurecraft it was just after 4.30 and we checked with the staff that the weekly turnaround checks had been done before going to the boat. The dogs got tied to the trailer whilst we unloaded everything and, as usual, weren’t allowed on board until Graham had sorted out the saloon, covering all the seating with copious fleece rugs and mats. His arrangements have got more sophisticated as time has gone by. For the last few trips he’s sewed channels into some of the rugs and cut up some broom handles to the right dimensions to rest in the surround to the back rests to hold the rugs in place. That's helped a lot as previously the rugs tended to need rearranging a lot. We also recovered a few cushions with cushion covers that we had brought from home, so we wouldn't need to worry about the dogs messing up the boat's cushions. We managed to unpack most things the first evening, and had a very light supper before having an early night. We have an early start in the morning! Lovely sunset this evening!