ruthandjohn

Courtesy of that green device in my lap ... it's like gas and air on steroids and they gave me that to reset my wrist ... I was basically completely stoned on another planet!!! Maybe, we have travel insurance anyway and I've got a few trips I've got to cancel as a result, boo! Thanks for all the good wishes folks!

Hey folks! Sadly our adventures on the broads were cut short! We had a wonderful time but on Friday night last week, I twisted my ankle on the steps outside the Reedcutter at Cantley (before we even got to the pub!) which caused me to fall on my left arm and badly fracture dislocate both radius and ulnar on my left side. Knew it was bad as soon as I'd done it, lucky for me a local paramedic happened to be leaving the pub just after it happened and her daughter drove us to James Paget as it could have been hours for an ambulance to get there. I had surgery on Sunday morning and was discharged on Monday. A friend who lives locally picked John up from the hospital and helped him to pack up the boat and get all our gear back to my car at Potter and then back home to ipswich while I was in hospital, and Herbert Woods collected the boat during the week. Needless to say absolutely devastated, we were having such a wonderful time - it's one of those things that happens though. Still in a lot of pain, probably a 3-6 month minimum recovery time and have to have checkups every few weeks. I won't post photos of the actual injury and x-rays in case you lose your dinner but here's a few from the last days. Best thing I chucked in the bag, rechargeable clip fan I normally use in the gym! Was super helpful in hospital too! This was just after they had set my wrist on Friday night, I had about 2 hours to eat before they wanted me nil by mouth for surgery so the A&E doctor raided the staff room biscuits! Ended up getting bumped to Sunday due to other urgent cases.

Lovely morning at Hardley Mill, quite a blow on first thing but glorious sunshine for my breakfast up top! Plodded down to Rockland arriving just after 12, managed to snag a stern morning just into the shade so John's a happy bunny! Still a few spaces but it was full to capacity earlier. Chilling out here for the day, maybe attempting the circular walk tomorrow morning when it's hopefully a little cooler! Bonkers hot during the motoring though, and it's set to get hotter during the rest of the week! 🥵

Yes, we're out for two weeks and didn't really feel the need to go dashing about the place. Just taking it fairly slow and having time at the places we are visiting, opportunities to go looking for caches or walks around the area (and lots of lay ins which we both need!) We have a few days on the plan where we're motoring a bit more than others, but mostly around 2-3 hours or so with a couple of shorter days.

Left Loddon after meeting with a friend who lives local for coffee, leisurely plod back to the main river. Only one small encounter with an overhanging tree while passing a boat but otherwise fine! Motored down to Hardley Mill and arrived early afternoon in time to look around the really fascinating displays in the visitor's center and take the tour up to the very top of the mill. Incredible to see all the machinery restored and working, and an amazing view of the Broads from the top. Several vertical step ladders and relatively confined spaces, so not for everybody! Spent the afternoon snagging a couple more geocaches in the area and enjoying the sunshine! Small note to self, if you can't get your foot on the pontoon don't try to step down while still moving forward and hope it will be ok ... It moves! Went flying almost face first into the reeds when we moored up, thankfully a few scrapes and bruises but no major harm done excepting pride!! 🙈😅🤣 Enjoying the cacophony of bird noises, much better than the 9.05am alarm call of a jack hammer on some new mooring piles being driven in at Loddon this morning! 🙉 Headed round to Rockland tomorrow hopefully, planning a very leisurely day!

No, we think something caused the electrics to trip a few hours into the evening and we had to restart the inverter. They were run down by about 430am but we think that was because it was the first day and the fridge was super full and on overdrive trying to get the temperature down, but not sure. It's been fine since but we've been on power most evenings so haven't really tested it.

We got to nearly 45% discount I think it was, for booking online with a HW loyalty, booking shortly after our last holiday, paying for the holiday upfront and being on the boat for two weeks. I feel like that's a better way to discount by rewarding loyalty and early booking and helps with business stability I'm guessing. The last time we came, our first trip on the Broads, we got a short notice cancellation which did have a discount applied but not much really, maybe 10%, can't really remember - it was in Covid times and someone had to cancel their booking at very short notice, so it was a genuine last minute cancellation and it worked out for us as we could make it during those times. While it would be great for prices to drop a bit, I feel that widespread discounting on a time before the holiday basis would probably devalue the whole thing and as others have said, could also lead to more last minute bookings which I'm guessing aren't so helpful from the business sustainability perspective.

We were a bit delayed getting to Potter on Friday thanks to the good old A14, got a text at 1.30pm telling us the boat was ready! Finally arrived about 2.45 and snagged a parking space surrounded by a large puddle thanks to the torrential downpour earlier - the car park was rammed, almost nowhere to park! Got checked in, first time in reception as our last trip was during Covid times so it was all done through the hatch at a distance! Got booked in the queue for the run through with 7 ahead of us so we just got on with loading up the boat. On the second trip with a large trolley he was waiting for us at the boat! 😳 As Ruth had done a lot of powerboating in the past and we'd had a boat from them before we didn't have to go and do the full trial, but we were guided out onto the river which was a real help as there were a bunch of boats coming in, several going out ... Flippin carnage! Got underway once most of the other boats got out of the way and headed down to Stracey Arms with a view to crossing Breydon the next day. Stacey was super quiet, maybe 3 other boats moored, which was good as we had an early start the next day. Alarm went off at 5am much to our disgust ... We had so little time at HW we hadn't done any unpacking so we were up quite late! Think between us we've hit our heads about 10 times already, which seems a common pasttime with this boat! Beautiful sunrise on the way to Breydon and very quiet, only saw a few boats. Plodded down to Breydon and got there bang on slack water. Took it slowly and steadily with the windscreen down and it was fine, like others say once you've done it once you wonder what the fuss is about! Smooth crossing, we were aiming for Reedham but it was full when we got there so went on a bit and found a lovely quiet mooring to snooze for a few hours and finish unpacking! By the time we got back to Reedham it was spring high tide and over-topped so we had to moor down the far end, as most of the quay was about a foot under! Thanks to the staff on the quayside we got moored and managed to get off without getting too wet, and got back on thanks to strategically placed mooring posts! 😅 Once the tide dropped a bit we moved back down the quay as we were out of battery and needed to recharge on the electric. Had a lovely 5 mile walk around the area to snag some geocaches and ended up headed to the chippy. In the morning we had a lovely breakfast in Cannell's before heading off into a strong tide, thanks again for the guidance from the folks on the quay we got away without incident! Ruth's turn to drive today and we were heading to Loddon .... Little did we realise how narrow and bendy it was! Talk about a baptism of fire getting used to the boat! 🤣 Arrived at Loddon early afternoon and we were super fortunate to find a space we could fit in, so Ruth's turn to do a stern-on mooring which went perfectly with a couple of little nudges on the thrusters! Now enjoying sitting in the sunshine watching the world go by and feeding the swan and ducks!

Thanks for the welcome! We are thinking we'll head up to Neatishead but not until the second week probably, maybe the 11th or there about.

Hey there! We're out on the Broads around the same time, two weeks from the 1st in our case, on Sovereign Light. Thanks for writing up your posts in 2021 on the boat, as I was just reading over them - hope to see you out on the water maybe!