YnysMon

March 30

Postscript

We haven’t that long before our next trip on MS. We have another fortnight on board (as a result of agreeing a number of swaps) from 31st May. I really enjoyed not having to negotiate fishermen on this trip, not that I’ve got anything against them, it just makes things easier, especially on moorings that are popular with the fishing community. Luckily, our next trip also falls within the closed fishing season, so that’s another bonus.

If anyone else is around early June, do let us know!

March 30

Friday 29th March

I had an awful night’s sleep. As you can imagine, the bow slap was something chronic, but even when I did sleep I had slightly unsettling dreams, which probably reflected by being tense about moving the boat to Boulter’s in the morning if the wind didn’t subside. I gave up just before 4 on trying to sleep and played a couple of games on my iPad, until Pozzick whined, wanting to go out, around 5am. So I got up, took the dogs out and then settled in the lounge until Graham got up around 7. We had a quick breakfast then started to pack our stuff.

Luckily the wind had dropped to a more reasonable level, and it wasn’t an issue to get into Boulter’s. As mentioned in my live thread, we were there quite a while (a couple of hours) whilst they guys in the yard tried to remove a blockage from their pump-out machine. Thank goodness they succeeded, as we were thinking that getting a pump-out elsewhere probably could have been an issue on a bank holiday. We knew that HPC had a lot of hires going out today, so would probably be too busy to do a pump-out, the same would probably be true for Ferry Marina, and who knew if Southgates would be open on a bank holiday.

Anyway, the time in Boulter’s wasn’t wasted. We just carried on with our packing and cleaning the interior of the boat, though we had to wait until we were back in HPC to clean the saloon as we needed to get the dogs off the boat to do that.

We managed to get away shortly after 12noon, and had a lunch stop at The Old Mill in Wroxham before making our way home. The Old Mill appears to be becoming our regular place for lunch on our final day. The menu isn’t fancy, but it’s not that expensive and is consistently good.

March 30

Thursday 28th March

We had thought to go as far as somewhere on the North Norfolk coast, such as Sheringham, today, but felt quite lazy. Instead, we just took the dogs to their favourite walking spot, Caister-on-Sea beach.

Back on board, we had a brunch, then just hunkered down for the rest of the day. The wind picked up as promised, with gusts of over 40mph, so it’s just as well we hadn’t gone anywhere by boat.

At least we had a rainbow.

I was hoping that the weather forecast, promising more moderate winds, was accurate for the following morning, as I had booked a slot in Boulter’s for 9am.

March 30

Wednesday 27th March

As the weather forecast was showing increasingly strong winds over the next couple of days, we decided not to cruise and to go places by car.

Last week, when we had been looking for a replacement grub screw for the 3-pin plug on the end of our canopy wire, it had been suggested that we try ASAP supplies, a marine supplies store on the Ellough Industrial Estate outside Beccles. We fancied visiting Bungay today, which is a small town not that far from Beccles, so that would give us an opportunity to visit the ASAP store.

We made sure not to repeat the mistake of going south via Oulton Broad today, taking the road leading to Lowestoft (A146) off the A47.

Anyway, the trip to ASAP supplies was fruitful. Graham managed to get a replacement 3-pin plug, which was the right size for our canopy electrical connection. Hopefully, that will make the electrical connection more robust.

Bungay turned out to be a little town with character and a sense of history, though it’s sad that several of the old inns were closed down and boarded up. It has a castle, an old market building ‘the Buttercross’, a couple of Anglican churches, and a Catholic one with an ornate exterior. It also has a range of independent shops, including fishmonger, good quality butcher, greengrocers etc. Several of the shops closed at 3pm though, and a couple weren’t open at all on a Wednesday.

We wandered from the car park (£1 for 2 hours) down St Mary’s Street where we spotted the Catholic Church...

and St Mary's Church...

plus a few other old buildings...

The Buttercross...

We visited ‘Gelato and Sorbetto’ which is a café as well as a gelato shop where we had coffee and cake. My Biscoff cake tasted lovely but was quite hard; I wasn’t sure if it was supposed to be like that or wasn’t particularly fresh.

After that we wandered around to have a look at Bigod Castle...

then the stores on Earsham Street before turning down Bridge Street, which took us down to the river. Bungay is also situated on the River Waveney, upriver from Beccles and Geldeston. Some of the houses down by the river were obviously fairly old. Some appeared to have redesigned the position of doors/windows at some point, others had a definite lean to them.

We only went as far as the bridge, to view the river.

After that we returned up the hill to visit St Mary’s Church. This one has been deconsecrated and is looked after by a church conservation organisation. It’s a peculiar shape, being all ‘nave’ and no ‘choir’. From the outside of the church the reason for this was obvious. The church had originally been much larger, having been attached to a nunnery, and the choir section which would normally have led up to the altar had been abandoned.

We then tried to visit the church that was in use: Holy Trinity Church. This had a round tower, typical of many churches in East Anglia, but what it is like inside I have no idea: it was locked.

We took a more sensible route home, taking the road to Norwich. Before making our way back to Horning we had a detour to Whitlingham Country Park, as the dogs needed to stretch their legs.

This evening I made us pasta, serving it with a sauce made from cashews and avocado blitzed smooth with lime juice, water, olive oil, garlic and nutritious yeast (instead of parmesan).

March 30

Tuesday 26th March

Early morning dog cuddles.

Just a trip back down the Ant this morning.

We had thought initially to stop at How Hill for a walk, but we decided it would be better to get under Ludham Bridge as early as possible as the tide was rising, and we wanted to avoid the faff of taking the canopy down. That worked out fine. Although there was less than 8’ on the board, we could clearly see the sills and had more than a few inches to space.

We had a very pleasant cruise up to Potter Heigham.

Pozzie could definitely smell something interesting on the wind as we chugged up the Thurne.

We got to Potter H shortly before 11am. There was plenty of room on the moorings, but several other boats arrived within the next half hour or so and the moorings quickly filled up.

We took the dogs for a walk southward behind the chalets, passing The Old Mill (also known as Bond Mill) and the Repps staithe. At the end of the stretch of chalets we turned around and retracted our steps.

This Pooh Bear looked a bit worse for wear! He can be spotted just north of the Repps Staithe.

As we were walking toward the boat, I recognised the guy on the Barnes Brinkcraft boat moored in front of us. It was Dan from YouTube channel ‘One Dan and his boat’. Once we’d got the dogs on board, I went to have a chat with Dan before making my way to Latham’s. I didn’t want much, just a new oven glove as the one on board MS was looking rather grubby. I thought it would be handy to have a spare so that I could take the other one home to wash it.

After I’d had my trip to Latham’s, it was Graham’s turn, whilst I stayed with the dogs. If we had our own boat, we would probably leave the dogs on board by themselves, but as we only have a share in the boat, we don’t do that.

Having done our Latham’s shop we had a sandwich lunch before debating whether to stay in Potter overnight or return to HPC, the latter won out, so we set out again and had a very pleasant cruise back to Horning where we enjoyed a quiet evening. Dinner this evening was oven roasted veg (crushed new potatoes, parsnips and carrots) with apple and sausages.

March 30

Monday 25th March

Yay – we got cruising again!

We had to wait a bit before setting out, as the basin of HPC was a bit like Piccadilly Circus this morning. There was a lot of boat manoeuvring going on, presumably with hires due to go out. They were even moving two boats at a time. That takes some skill!

We made our way up the Ant this morning. It was a very pleasant morning, which was lucky as there was barely 7½‘ showing on the board downriver of Ludham Bridge. We played safe and took both canopy and screen down. It’s lucky there wasn’t any other traffic on the river as I had to bring the boat to a halt mid-river to help Graham with the screen.

We kept screen and canopy down for the rest of the journey, ending up at Neatishead as Irstead Staithe was already occupied.

There were only a couple of other boats at Neatishead when we arrived, but they left soon after. A few other boats arrived before lunch and then departed. Others arrived after lunch, but even so we ended up with only four boats (including us) overnight. Very peaceful.

I made us a brunch and after having that we took the dogs out for a walk. We followed the path that runs from opposite the ‘Fudge Lady’s’ house toward Threehammer Common. There’s a branch off that path that runs toward Long Road (the lane that starts almost opposite Gay’s Staithe), and then along another footpath that runs diagonally across the opposite field. Then there was a short stretch down Water Lane and then a right turn down Alderfen Lane before following another footpath that took us back to the end of Long Road and then back along the first footpath we had taken. One good thing, the path that leads over to Threehammer Common is a hill, and I found that I had good phone signal up there, whereas I had zilch on Neatishead Staithe.

As we were returning to the boat, we met Simon and his little dog Susie. Pozzie, being Pozzie (he loves little dogs) wanted to play, but Susie wasn’t having any of it. Little dogs have attitude, I guess they have to, as dogs as big as Pozzie must be rather challenging!

We had another lazy evening, not even watching telly, as we didn’t have signal for that either.

We had a very light supper again, after having another belly busting brunch earlier.

March 30

Sorry we missed you on our latest trip Kate. Thanks for the update, I was wondering whether you were likely to be back on the rivers soon.

Are you likely to be around early June?

March 30

Sunday 24th March

Another non-cruising day today.

Harry needed to get back to MK, so that he could attend band practise this evening and later in the week, so Graham drove him home.

Meanwhile I lazed around for a while, tidied up the boat a bit and then set out for a walk to Ludham Bridge, making my way up School Road, with a view of St Benedict's Church over the fields.

I went as far as the X junction with Grove Road/Church Road, where there’s a footpath that runs diagonally across a field, bring you out at the end of a row of houses on the Horning to Ludham road (Norwich Road).

Crossing the road I continued along another footpath down the lane opposite and then through a gate. This was padlocked, but there was a gap at the side of the gate for walkers.

This footpath eventually heads toward Hall Road (just south of Alderfen Broad and a bit further east from the Radar Museum), but there’s a branch that takes you along a dyke toward Neave’s Mill, which I followed.

From Neave’s Mill you can walk along a dyke running south , following the line of the river, until you reach the Norwich Road a 100 yds of so from Ludham Bridge.

There was a guy with a camera on a tripod on the bridge, who I guessed is probably one of the people with a YouTube channel that regularly films at Ludham Bridge, no doubt hoping for mishaps as there was a fairly brisk wind. I also noticed a lady sitting in a car facing the river who had a mobile phone on a stand on her dash, and wondered if she was the ‘Same name’ lady. I don't think either of them were likely to have got much footage today, as there weren't many boats passing Ludham Bridge. It must be pretty boring doing all that filming.

I visited Dollies Bakery and got myself a takeaway coffee and a cinnamon bun which I took to the picnic bench on the opposite bank from Ludham Boatyard. They do have seating inside, but I always feel self-conscious if I’m the only customer in a café.

My route back to the boat took me down lane that leads to Horning Hall and some holiday cottages.

There's a track from the holiday cottages that leads in the direction of St Benedict’s Church, with a final stretch down Church Lane and then back down School Road. The track follows a ridge overlooking the Bure valley, with a view across to St Helen's, Ranworth.

Approaching St Benedict's - almost home!

After all the floods in January and February, the HPC yard had been almost dry earlier in the week. Not so much today at high tide!

My late lunch, when I got back to the boat, was a dressed crab that I’d got in Roy’s yesterday, with new potatoes and a side salad. I was wishing I’d chosen the medium crab rather than the large though!

I hardly did anything the rest of the day, apart from running the Shark vacuum cleaner around. I watched the rest of the Great British Menu final episode on iPlayer (having got too tired yesterday evening to watch both the penultimate finals episode and the final final). Graham got back before dark, so I had his company this evening.

We had a what looked like a full moon this evening.

March 30

Saturday 23rd March

We had another trip by car today, visiting Southwold. The day was mostly sunny, but we did have the occasional shower, which we managed to dodge.

It took us a lot longer to get there than anticipated. Shirley, our sat nav, took us there via Great Yarmouth and Oulton Broad, rather than the road that goes past Beccles. Oulton Broad proved to be a horrible bottleneck. It must have taken us at least ¾ of an hour to get through. I suppose most of the traffic trying to get along the coast must pass though there. We resolved not to return that way.

So it was getting on for mid-day by the time we got to Southwold. We parked near the pier, then took the dogs for a walk along a path that leads from the car park.

Tucking the dogs back in the car, the first priority was to find somewhere for lunch. We made our way to the high street, passing the church and the Adnam’s brewery and Adnam's shop on the way (and resolving to return to both later).

We ended up having lunch in the Tiptree Tea Rooms (owned by the people who make the Tiptree jams) where we enjoyed a sandwich/toastie lunch.

After that, we browsed the shops down the high street. There were several with sales still on, so I managed to get a new cardie in the White Stuff shop (60% off) and a new thick sweatshirt type top in Weird Fish (30% off).

We stopped off at the Harris & James (H&J) Gelato Shop in on the corner of East Street/Pinkney's Lane. Graham was really taken with his bakewell tart flavoured gelato, but slightly regretted getting a ‘two-scoop’ cone, as it was very large. Harry had salted caramel, and I had a mango and passion fruit sorbet in a ‘one-scoop’ cone. One scoop was plenty large enough!

We then made our way back to the Church, passing the brewery on the way. There was a tantalising whiff of beer in the making as we passed the Adnams factory.

The church is well worth a visit, having a beautiful ‘angel’ roof and medieval rood screens. The screens across the side aisles were obviously by a different workshop of craftsmen than the main rood screen dividing the navel from the choir section of the church.

Harry and I then went to the Adnams shop whilst Graham went back to the car to let the dogs out. We didn’t buy much: Harry just got himself a couple of beers and I bought some cider for Alec.

On our way back to the car Harry and I wandered onto the pier. It's free to get onto and has a number of attractions and cafes.

Before setting out for home we drove to down Ferry Road toward the Lifeboat Station, near the mouth where the River Blyth reaches the sea. The dogs had a good run along the area behind the dunes.

We then drove along Blackshore, which is a rough track that goes past the ferry to Walberswick, moorings along the River Blyth, various fresh fish stalls (all closed) and the harbour master’s office, before making our way back into Southwold and on our way ‘home’ (It’s funny how I’ve started to refer to MS as ‘home’ when she’s on her mooring in Horning.)

The journey back to Horning was a lot better, skirting Beccles along a newish by-pass route.

We stopped off in Wroxham again so that I could visit Roy’s to get something for my lunch tomorrow.

March 30

Friday 22nd March

As I had promised the HPC yard manager that Moonlight Shadow would be available today to take the push pit rail off, we set off early from Acle, so that we could get back to the yard around 8am. I had also emailed him asking if one of the engineers could look at our main heads, as it was leaking badly when flushed. I don’t know whether it was coincidence, but we first noticed the leaking after our Breydon crossing on Saturday, so I don’t know whether the boat being violently tossed about by the wake of another boat had anything to do with it. Initially we assumed that the leak was from the water intake, but soon realised that it was leaking from the point at which the porcelain bowl of the loo was connecting to the pipe leading to the tank. Essentially it was leaking sewage. Yuk! Luckily for us, the yard fixed the problem today whilst we were off the boat.

Shortly after we arrived at HPC this heron paid us a visit, walking along our finger pontoon.

We went to Norwich by car today, parking in the same car park that we had used on our last trip, the Rose Lane car park not far from the Yacht Station. We didn’t bother visiting the Cathedral this time, but just had a wander through the city centre, browsing a few shops. First we went down a side street on the opposite side of The Prince of Wales Road from the Car Park to find this little garden. I had read that it was a good place to take your dog, as it's pretty enclosed, and is in easy reach of the Yacht Station. It's called the James Stuart Garden.

One of the shops we browsed in was Jarrold's.

I hadn’t visited their basement food hall before. It was well worth a visit as they stock a lot of local Norfolk-made produce, including the H&J chocolates that are made in Beccles. Harry and I selected a couple of bars of chocolate to sample on the boat later. We got a Banoffee Pie bar and a Salted Pecan and Raisin one.

After Jarrold's, we had a wander around the market. We bought Graham a vegan mushroom and ale pie from the Pie Stall (Harry and I still had the large steak in the Beccles butches, which I planned to cook this evening). Graham spotted the pet shop stall that’s at the front of the market and decided to buy Pozzie a new bed. It was rather large though, so we put off buying it until after we’d had lunch. It was almost time for lunch, so we made our way to Shikki in Tombland (near the Cathedral).

The visit to Shikki was really our motivation for going to Norwich today. When we visited Norwich in January the restaurant had been closed for their annual new year holiday, so Graham had missed out on sampling its delights. We all had a bento box meal. You choose a main and a sushi/sashimi course and it comes with a small starter, rice, side salad and miso soup. The starter seems to be different each time we visit, and there isn’t a choice. Luckily, the starter today was vegetarian, a small portion of Japanese omelette, so okay for Graham. We both chose a tofu and braised vegetables main whilst Harry had the breaded pork. I had sushi, Graham and vegetarian sushi and Harry had sashimi, which this time included a couple of slices of octopus.

The Starter

Our meals.

Graham's

Mine

Harry's

Having enjoyed our meal, we made our way back to the market to buy the dog bed, then returned to the car. I googled ‘dog friendly parks’ tot try to find somewhere on the way back to Horning to take the dogs for a run and entered Catton Park into our sat nav. This didn’t work out though, as we couldn’t find anywhere to park when we got to the location. Instead, we just stopped off in Wroxham. Graham and Harry took the dogs for a run along the BA Viaduct moorings whilst I popped to Roy’s for a few bits and bobs.

We had a lazy time for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

Pozzie waiting for his dinner.

The dog bed that we had bought proved to be ginormous. Ironically, it was Seren who settled on it, rather than Pozzy. She occupied a tiny corner. :default_rofl:

This evening Harry and I had the Beccles steak, divided between us. Our eyes had definitely been bigger than our bellies though, so we should have chosen one of the smaller steaks. Graham enjoyed his Pie Stall pie.

March 30

5 minutes ago, Mouldy said:

I’ve found a similar issue with the Aweigh App, where when it’s first opened, the data doesn’t always display correctly. Closing the app properly (and I’ve no idea how to do that with a Google phone) and reopening it seems to make it behave for me.

It may work for you too!

Yes, I worked that one out during our second week!

March 30

Thursday 21st March

Originally, we had planned to return north on Friday, but decided against this for two reasons:

a) Slack water at Yarmouth on the Friday would probably mean that we’d end up night nav’ing before we even got as far as Stokesby or Acle and

b) The starboard push pit rail was due to be taken off the boat to be sent off for a repair, having experienced a bit of a prang during a visit to Boulter’s a few weeks back when it was particularly a windy day (people familiar with Boulter’s won’t be surprised) so we needed to get the boat back to Horning either tomorrow or Monday.

Anyway, we decided it would be better to return north today, aiming to pass through Yarmouth sometime between 3 and 3.30pm. We set off from Beccles shortly before the turn of the tide, but that didn’t really matter as the tide turns earlier downstream.

We took it easy. Luckily, we didn’t need to drop the canopy for Somerlayton or St Olave’s bridges, and moored up at St Olaves BA moorings late morning.

We took the dogs for a walk. First, we skirted the edge of the Waveney Forest, following a route that’s marked as a public footpath on the OS map. This walk started off well, but the further we went the more difficult it became as there were branches across the path. I don’t think this footpath has been checked and maintained for quite some time.

The path seemed to be frequented by deer, so we put the dogs on their leads.

Looking out on the marshes that lead down to the river.

We got to a point where the path skirting the forest joined a track leading into the forest. There was a gate across it, but it was easy to skirt around the gate. I was a bit worried that we might be trespassing, but a minute later we met an elderly gentleman walking his dog, who seemed very familiar with the forest. He said that he used to clear the footpath, but that it’s too much for him now. From there on it was much easier going. A lot of the tracks seemed to be used by trail bikes.

It’s very noticeable that there’s a lot less bird song within pine forests than on the edges where there’s more variety of tree species. I used the Merlin App on my phone again whilst we were skirting the forest and picked up the song of Robins, Great Tits, Blue Tits, Wrens, Chiffchaff, Chaffinches, Lesser Black-headed Gulls, and Siskins.

Pesky dogs! Just as we reached the track that led back to the boat they both got themselves very muddy again.

Back on the boat we had a sandwich lunch and then waited until the time that we thought it would be good to start off, if we were to get to Yarmouth at the time we were hoping to. We set off shortly after 1.30.

We took it easy and didn’t increase our revs across Breydon as we could see that the tide was still flowing out, not lessening until we got to the far end near the bridges.

We only passed one hire boat, plus the Spirit of Breydon sporting flashing lights and accompanying a BA barge.

The tide on the Bure was still flowing out when we turned at the yellow post.

So it was a bit of a slog, as usual, up the Bure.

We didn’t get to Acle until around 5pm. We had been hoping to get to our home mooring in Horning this evening, and we could have done, but I was feeling tired and didn’t fancy trying to stern moor in failing light when I was feeling so tired, so I persuaded Graham that we should stop at Acle overnight. We should have turned the boat around though, as we had to contend with noisy bow slap overnight.

There was a rather cheeky duck at Acle, plus a glorious sunset.

By the way, I must point out Graham's solution for keeping the saloon extra cosy. It's just an IKEA throw with a channel created with safety pins that a small curtain rod holds up. It doesn't half make a difference to the temperature in the saloon. You really feel the difference in temperature when you pass through to the galley!

March 30

Wednesday 20th March

Another dawn start this morning. We were planning to make it to Beccles today and wanted to arrive before the Harbour Master’s office closed (open mornings only until the end of March) as we wanted to purchase some electric. Also, high water at Beccles was due mid-morning, and I didn’t fancy slogging all the way up the Waveney against the tide.

Yet again, we had a gloomy start to the morning, so no spectacular sunrise. It is still lovely starting off early though.

We were surprised that the Reedham Ferry was operating so early.

Once through the Reedham bridge Harry and I kept our eyes peeled for deer, as we’ve spotted deer a couple of times in a garden just downriver of the bridge. Whilst we didn’t see any deer, we did spot an otter near Reedham Marina, running along the bank.

We cruised all the way from Loddon to Beccles today without passing a single boat (apart from a few that were moored at Reedham, Somerlayton and North Cove – and that was a very few). I always appreciate getting through the New Cut without having to pass other boats. It’s so nice to be able to go down the middle and not worry about the posts.

As we were approaching Somerlayton, we took down our canopy, as high tide was almost due. We got through without needing to drop the windscreen though.

We travelled all the way up the Waveney with the last of the incoming tide, arriving at Beccles just before high tide was due there.

Once we were settled on our mooring at Beccles, Harry and I walked up to the town centre. Part way up Northgate, we pondered whether this was the entrance to Diagon Alley, but as Hagrid wasn't with us, we'll never know.

Harry wanted to visit a hardware/DIY store as we have a recurring problem with the 3-pin plug that connects our canopy to the electrical system. Even if you remember to unscrew it before lowering the canopy the weight of the connecting wire tends to put pressure on the connecting end. Today the end that I had unscrewed from the connection actually fell off. Graham has rewired it several times, but there’s an issue with one of the grub screws that secures one of the wires. Part of the head is missing, so it’s very difficult to screw it tight. We enquired in the Cooper's hardware store in the centre of Beccles. They recommended we visit a specialist electrical store, City Electrical, opposite B&M.

Before going there we went to the butchers opposite the Kings Arms and got ourselves a nice looking steak, and then visited Tesco's.

On our way to the electrical store we passed this...

So that's why Pound Lane is called that. I never knew.

The electrical store didn’t have what we were looking for either, but recommended we visit ASAP marine suppliers. That wasn’t possible on foot, as it’s located east of Beccles, nearer to Worlingham. As we were making our way to the electric store we passed the Harris and James chocolate factory. There was a really delicious smell of chocolate emanating from one of their vents as we passed. A very deep chocolatey smell that suggested high quality. We must look out for their chocolate! Apparently they sell it in Twyfords Café in Beccles.

Back on the boat, I made us a rather too large brunchy lunch. Sausage, bacon, black pud, mushrooms, tomato, egg for Harry and I, plus a reheated sweetcorn and courgette fritters each. Graham had the same, but without the sausage, bacon and black pud, but had some griddled halloumi to compensate.

After lunch we vegetated for a while before going for a walk around Carlton Marshes. We followed the river bank as far as the old swing bridge near Aldeby, then cut inland along the route of the old railway.

The old swing bridge.

Shortly after I took this photo, Harry called Pozzick over as I wanted to take a photo with the dogs in the shot. When Harry got hold of his harness, Pozzick pulled away, looking quite distressed. He flattened himself on the ground. We are convinced he thought Harry was going to chuck him in the river, and are even more convinced this is what happened to him previously before we rescued him from the river bank.

There were some structures on the Beccles Carlton Marshes side of the river that looked like the remains of a platform of a signal box. Apparently, there used to be one close to the bridge (similar to Somerlayton).

The dogs had fun and games with a 'stick' on the way back to the boat.

By the time we were nearing the Yacht Station it was getting on for sunset.

I didn’t fancy doing much cooking again, so Graham and Harry went off to Lidl to get a pizza. We looked at the Oakfired menu, but decided on a cheaper option. I regretted this later during the night, as dairy plus early spring hay fever is not a good combination.

Tired dogs.

It's been another lovely day.

March 30

Tuesday 19th March

We were fairly relaxed about getting away this morning as we were planning a fairly short cruise up to Loddon.

We thought we’d stop off somewhere to give the dogs for a walk, either Hardley Mill or Cross. Harry took to whistling the Willy Wonka tune ‘Pure Imagination’ as we passed Cantley. I wonder why? 😊

In the event, there weren’t any other boats moored at the Mill, so we stopped there. Graham had a look at the electric posts, and it appeared that there was over £2.50 credit on one, so we plugged in and contemplated staying there overnight to take advantage of free electric.

Whilst we were moored this barge came past, with a boat suspended beside them. A sort of half tow half lift. Judging by the patina on the boat it must have spend some time submerged. Good to know that such boats are being lifted.

We took the dogs for a walk along to Hardley Dyke and back. Seren is a tinker, she still chases boats that are passing, but is better nowadays at responding to Graham’s whistle to call her back.

When we got back to the boat I made lunch. Sweetcorn and courgette fritters with bacon.

Graham noticed that the electric had gone off. The post had somehow lost all credit, so we decided not to stay there overnight after all. I had read in the recent BA newsletter, that was sent out with the letter regarding tolls, that the BA were planning to replace the electric posts at Hardley Mill. At least one of the posts must be playing up and not working properly.

We then went on our way again, hoping the tide had turned and would help us up the Chet to Loddon. Harry helmed most of the way. He found the river rather narrower than usual in places, particularly some of the bends on the lower river where there were reeds growing quite far out into the channel. It looked to me as though flood water had maybe broken up the bank, leaving some clumps of reeds further out.

There was only one other boat at Loddon and loads of room in the basin. We moored up in the middle and Graham went to check the electric posts. There wasn’t any credit to speak of, so we moved the boat on its ropes further away from the road.

The rest of the day was pretty lazy, as is usual for us.

This evening we just had the remains of the haggis cottage pie reheated, with a bit of broccoli on the side. It wasn’t a huge helping, so Graham had bought some sponge puds and a tin of custard in Co-op earlier. He had also bought some Alpro choc puds for me, but I was full anyway.

We watched the fish course finals of the Great British Menu this evening, having missed the starters finals yesterday evening.

March 30

Monday 18th March

Graham and I got up fairly early again to take the dogs out, but we then lazed around and had breakfast before waking Harry up. Later we all went for a walk toward Herringfleet Mill.

From there the path continued northward along the river bank and took us all the way to the Herringfleet moorings. When we got to there, we found a sign that said there was no right of way along the way we had just come. That’s a fat lot of use if you’ve started out from Somerlayton, where there’s a sign saying the footpath is a permissive one. We had no choice other than to return the way we had come anyway.

Once back at the boat we didn’t allow the dogs back on until their legs had been washed, as they had both gone into the reeds and come out with very smelly, muddy legs.

We then set out on our way to the Yare. It was a glorious morning. We had the New Cut completely to ourselves, apart from a seal that was sunning itself. He/she flapped a flipper at us, but otherwise was fairly unconcerned.

Once on the Yare we found there was still some outgoing flow, despite the tide having ‘turned’.

We stopped off at Hardley Cross for a while.

I made us some sweetcorn and courgette fritters which we had with bacon (vegan version for Graham).

After lunch we continued up the Yare, thinking to go to the Morrison’s at Norwich and then moor at Bramerton, but it was getting on for three by the time we were passing the Rockland Dykes, so we would have probably been leaving Norwich after sunset by the time we’d done shopping. Instead we moored at Brundall Gardens. Graham stayed on the boat with the dogs whilst Harry and I went up to Brundall to visit a Co-op, actually we ended up visiting both, as the first didn’t have a couple of items that we wanted. The walk up to the village was lovely, even though there’s only some new growth so far. The birds sounded particularly busy and, as described in my ‘live’ thread, the Merlin App on my phone identified several birds.

Once we had returned to the boat we set out again downriver.

Graham often views cruising as quality reading time, and Pozzie as 'chill out' time.

Seren and I, on the other hand, are fully engaged with the journey.

We made our way to Rockland St Mary, getting there around 5pm.

The moorings were unoccupied, but another boat arrived shortly after us.

We had another peaceful evening. Dinner was mushrooms and chestnuts in a sauce made from vegan crème fraiche and wholegrain mustard, served with rice.

I retired fairly early this evening. The fresh air must be getting to me!

March 30

Sunday 17th March

Pozzie woke us up just after 5am this morning, whining. Which is usually a sign that he needs to relieve himself. I was awake anyway, so took him out, leaving Seren with Graham, as I can’t cope with the two of them if they both pull in the same direction. When I got back, I stayed in the lounge with the dogs whilst Graham had a few more zzz’s. It was a fairly gloomy morning, with showers forecast for most of the day. Not that we minded. We had a lazy sort of morning mostly, though we did take the dogs out for a couple of morning walks around the park. It was lovely to see the sailing races. There were quite a few sailboards out too.

Just before mid-day we made our way to the Copper Smokehouse as I had booked a table. They were very dog friendly, allocating us a table out of the way and bringing each dog their own bowl of water. The service was excellent and very friendly and the food divine. I had their smoked brisket and Graham had the vegetarian ‘roast’, which was a celeriac schnitzel. Both came with a very generous helping of roasties (4 good sized ones), a ginormous yorkshire, creamed leeks, mashed sweet potato, roast carrots and parsnips and a bowl of greens; kale, broccoli spears and mange tout. The gravy that came with the roasts tasted really smoky.

Graham's celeriac roast.

My brisket.

The veggies.

Harry had smoked pork belly with hasselback potatoes, stem broccoli, savoy cabbage and a bacon madeira cream, which he said was so tasty. It also came with a pot of gravy that tasted like it had apple in it.

I couldn’t manage a pud, but Graham somehow put away a generous helping of toffee banana cake with bananas, ice cream and toffee sauce and Harry managed a crème brulee with shortbread.

The Sunday menu.

After lunch we set off for pastures new. The original plan had been to go to Beccles tonight and then somewhere further down the Waveney the following day, but that would be two days of fairly short cruises, and the downside of Beccles is that the Yacht Station is only open in the mornings until Easter, so unless we phoned ahead to ask for credit to be put on a post for us, we’d be without 240v electricity.

Somerlayton was ideal. Very quiet, apart from the trains. We were the only boat there and there was about 50p on the post when we got there at 3pm. We put another £1 on and switched on our little radiator. We prefer that to using the Webasto as it’s less noisy and the temperature is easier to regulate. It was still drizzly and breezy at this point, but it started to clear up shortly after 4pm. The wind dropped and the sun came out. We had a lovely sunset.

Naturally, we didn’t want much to eat this evening, making do with some coronation egg sandwiches (i.e. egg mayo spiced up with a little korma curry pasta and a small amount of mango chutney).

The dogs had a treat this evening, as I had brought the remains of my smoked brisket back to the boat in a foil parcel.

Once the trains had stopped for the night it was completely peaceful, except that Graham heard a few long freight trains crossing the bridge in the wee small hours.

March 30

Saturday 16th March

The alarm was set for 04:30 and we were on our way just before 5. Harry kept the dogs in his aft cabin whilst we were setting off, as I needed to have the hatch over the helm seat open and the dogs are normally very vocal whenever Graham is on deck. Luckily there was hardly a breath of wind, so I edged very slowly out of our ‘berth’, probably the noisiest bit was using bow thrusters, but I thought that would lessen the time we were being a nuisance compared to trying to turn without the thrusters.

As we started off, there was quite an orangey glow in the sky to the west, which we guessed must have been the ‘bright lights’ of Norwich, and just the hint of dawn in the east. (And yes, I did set off still wearing my PJs, with a cosy top thrown over.)

By the time we got to St Benet’s it was getting much lighter, and we got to Acle at around dawn, though the cloudy sky in the east meant we couldn’t see the dawn. I love a good dawn, but when you are travelling down to Gt Yarmouth it can be a bit trying for the eyes, so maybe it was just as well it was cloudy.

Nearing Stracey Arms.

We saw nothing else on the river until we got to Marina Quays. I guess that person may have believed the Aweigh App as we did, as he had a reasonably high air-draft and would have wanted to get through at low water. I did another check on the Aweigh App tides – only to find that the forecast for low water had changed to 08:24! Grrr!

Oh well, as I had also checked the Project Troll site, I knew we would be able to get under the bridges without taking our canopy down, as the tide was still falling.

Of course we had a chug across Braydon against the tide. There were only a couple of boats going the ‘other way’ and one sporty type boat overtook us on our starboard side unexpectedly at quite a pace. I tried to turn into their wake, but wasn't quick enough so the waves hit us diagonally. Moonlight Shadow got tossed around from side to side like a cork…not nice at all! Bordering on frightening to be honest.

We turned up the Waveney at the end of Breydon and stopped at the Burgh Castle moorings. Time to allow the dogs a comfort break and to stretch their legs. We only went as far as the mill that is called ‘Black Drainage Mill’ on the OS map, so not a long walk.

We also took the opportunity to have some tea and toast. Tea and cereal bars had been consumed earlier on the way, so I guess it was a second breakfast.

We got on our way again around 11am and took our canopy down, just in case we didn’t have enough clearance at St Olaves. We needn’t have bothered as there was just over 8’ (which is what we need with the canopy up). I was glad we’d taken the canopy down though, as it's less stressful. It was also turning out to be a beautifully sunny day, plenty warm enough to cruise with the canopy down.

It was getting on for 1.30pm by the time we got to Oulton Broad. I had thought to moor on the inner side of the pontoon, but that was taken up by boats moored side-on. Most of the moorings on the opposite, outer, side were taken too, though we could probably have squeezed into a gap. Most of the stern-on moorings on the outward bit of pontoon that faces toward the Sailing Club were free though, so we had no problem finding a space. We probably had a bit more bow-slap than we would have had on the inner side though.

Graham and Harry went off to ‘Wood’n’Dough’, a new takeaway pizza place that has opened up in the small courtyard near the Yacht Station. We just had the one pizza between us – beetroot and goats cheese. I’d never realised beetroot would be so nice on a pizza. They weren't busy and took hardly any time it make the pizza freshly.

Wood’n’Dough

The pizza.

We just lazed around the rest of the afternoon. Graham and Harry both went off to their cabins for naps. I stuck it out with the dogs and started to prepare the dinner. This just meant cooking and mashing some spuds, as I’d brought the rest of the dish with me from home. A few weeks ago we had a vegetarian haggis, ale and mushroom cottage pie with a side of braised red cabbage. The haggis mixture and the red cabbage had been enough for two meals, so I’d just frozen them. Very handy for this evening!

March 30

Moonlight Shadow Trip 18 - 15th to 29th March 2024

Friday 15th March

Eldest son Harry was able to join us on this trip.

We started off reasonably early, so got to La Hogue Farm Shop café late morning. Harry had an impressive burger, with bacon mayo on it as well as lots of other goodies. Graham had a veggie breakfast whilst I just had a toasted teacake with dairy-free spread. I don’t know what’s got into me on recent car trips up to Anglesey and Norfolk; I know I’m hungry, but somehow I can’t eat much. It’s weird and disconcerting. This was the specials board at La Hogue...

Back on our way, we had a good journey to the outskirts of Norwich. We wanted to take the dogs for a walk before going for our food shop, so we turned northward when we got to the A47 and aimed for the University of East Anglia (UEA) Campus. They have a lot of open land running down to the River Yare and what's marked on the map as 'the UEA Broad', and we found that the first car park that you come across when you turn into the campus was free – at least for a limited time.

After our dog walk, we drove to the Sainsbury’s store in Thorpe St Andrew. Youngest son Alec is now working in our local Sainsbury’s, so his Dad has a staff ‘family’ discount card. We used to do most of our shop in Lidl and then go to Sainsbury’s for things we couldn’t get in Lidl, but now that we have a discount, there doesn’t seem much point in doing that.

It was about 3.30 by the time we’d done our shop, rather too early to be going to the boat (official pick-up time is 5pm), but we thought we’d chance it and check with the Yard whether the turnaround checks had been done before going to the boat. We timed it perfectly, the checks had just been completed a few minutes earlier, and we were free to start loading the boat.

It was good to have the extra time to load and sort out the boat in daylight. We didn’t bother with much of a dinner this evening…my usual lazy standby of pasta with vegan pesto. This evening we tried gluten free pasta, to see if that made any difference digestion wise. The jury is out on that one.

The dogs settled down well on board.

As did the humans.

Having checked the Aweigh App, we decided to start out earlier tomorrow than planned. The long-range tide forecast for Yarmouth was for low tide at 8am. Aweigh was forecasting 07:05, so we decided we should start out around 5am tomorrow morning. That’s about an hour before dawn.

Graham warned the crew on Silver Cloud that we’d be starting off early. I don’t think he said quite how early though!

March 30

8 hours ago, ExSurveyor said:

We have three grandchildren until Monday, they only pleaded to come on Thursday, bless.

How lovely that they are so keen to join you.

March 30

Good to know that The Ferry Inn in Horning is improved. We must try it out next trip.

We had lunch in The Old Mill in Wroxham yesterday. We both had a vegetarian burger with chips. A simple meal, but it was very good for what it was, with home-made coleslaw. The place was heaving, but then it was a bank holiday. We were lucky to get a table.

Sorry for thread drift. Your holiday tale is turning into a pub/cafe review site.

:default_coat:

March 29

3 hours ago, Broads01 said:

Coincidentally, my near neighbour this evening is video blogger Dan (of the One Dan and his Boat channel). I'd not met Dan before so went over to say hello and have some boaty conversation.

I met Dan whilst we were at Potter earlier this week. Nice to see him back on the Broads and hopefully with one of his videos to look forward to.

March 29

As mentioned on Simon’s thread, I didn’t have the best night’s sleep last night. Yesterdays high winds continued into the wee small hours and the thought of getting into Boulter’s must have been weighing on my mind as I had several weird dreams, not scary, but a bit unsettling. In between dreams I’d wake up and listen to the wind. I gave up just before 4am and played some games on my iPad, then Pozzie whined, wanting to go out at 5, so I got up and left Graham slumbering.

We had an appointment at Boulter’s for 9am. The wind had dropped considerably, but was still fairly gusty, so I phoned Boulter’s before leaving HPC asking if they could help us get in with our ropes once we arrived.

We were at Boulter’s a while, almost two hours in fact. They had a problem with their pump out machine, a blockage in the sucky-out pipe (technical term). Bless them, the guys there just continued to try to unblock it and finally succeeded. I give them full marks for perseverance. It wasn’t much of an inconvenience for us, as Graham and I just continued to pack our stuff and started cleaning the boat.

Mooring up back at our home mooring wasn’t a problem either, and we managed to get away shortly after midday. The plan was to offload our recycling at Wroxham, which didn’t work out as the two recycling bins had been filled up with large pieces of cardboard. We had a good lunch at The Old Mill though.

We were home before 5pm, with no delays. It’s a good thing we weren’t going in the opposite direction, as that traffic was horrendous, especially on the A11 just before Norwich and Barton Mills.

March 29

19 hours ago, Broads01 said:

It's been blowing quite a hooly this evening. I opened the door to put Suzie out for her last pee and a gust blew it wide open. There is something nice about being in bed on a boat though when you can hear the weather outside.

Except when it’s blowing a hoolie and you know that you have an early appointment the following morning at Boulter’s and then have to return to your home mooring. I didn’t sleep well last night, waking quite frequently between slightly anxious dreams.

March 28

Seeing the weather forecast, we didn’t cruise anywhere today either. The dogs enjoyed a walk this morning at Caister-on-Sea and we just hunkered down this afternoon.

I just hope the strong winds die down before we visit Boulter’s tomorrow morning!

March 28

11 hours ago, Broads01 said:

You syndicate folks are dedicated. I admire you giving up your valuable holiday time, I don't think I could do it.

It just feels different when you have so much time on the boat. Also, the longer you are in a syndicate the more ‘ownership’ you feel. Well, maybe I’m generalising there, but that’s how Graham and I feel. I recall on our first few trips how unsure we were of everything. It took us quite a few trips before we really got to know the boat.

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