Carried Away By A Moonlight Shadow...

[YnysMon]

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!

[YnysMon]

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. 

[Lulu]

Great write up Helen. Certainly covered a fair few miles.  

[grendel]

we sed 80 litres on Broad Ambition over lads week, but we also did 5 hours more cruising than the other 2 boats (to and from the wet shed) and we were against the tide quite a lot during our week (and certainly tuesday when we had to get from cantley all the way to griffs corner, so despite the tide against us were on the speed limit all the way (we did pass 3 boats on the lower bure that seemed to be struggling against the tide, but the 2 symphonies have the same engines as BA does (though she has the 4 blade prop)

[kpnut]

Super write-up Helen, with the most delightful photos, especially of the dogs. 
It sounds like this trip was extremely relaxing. 

[YnysMon]

1 hour ago, kpnut said:

Super write-up Helen, with the most delightful photos, especially of the dogs. 
It sounds like this trip was extremely relaxing. 

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. 

[Broads01]

Thanks for the write up and photos Helen, an enjoyable read as always. I really like the photo you took at Dutch Tea Gardens of Graham relaxing against the sunset in the background, it tells the story.

[YnysMon]

Just four sleeps to go before we are on MS again. Hopefully the water levels might have gone down a bit by then. 🤞

[Matt]

I hope so! By all accounts the yard is a bit underwater. Last weeks owners came home early. Wellies certainly needed to get to the boat at the moment!

[YnysMon]

Wellies definitely!

Ooo, and I forgot to mention that the sale of one of the shares that we had up for offer went through last week, with the new owners having confirmed they received the keys to the boat today. So they are all set for their first week on MS early next month.

We currently have one other share available. If anyone is interested, please email admin@moonlightshadow.net or send me a pm. 

[kpnut]

Definitely wellies and if you haven’t got one already, perhaps a piece of rope to attach to a roof rail to help pull yourself up onto the boat (depending of course on its design). 
And lots and lots of dog towels!

The water’s not shifting at the moment. I’m at Horning, arriving dead on low tide and the water was about 2” below the top. Saying that it didn’t really overtop (at the Swan end) while I’ve been here. 
 

Generally, I could say moorings are in short supply - I’ve passed by Womack dyke, St Benets, cockshoot, Horning church and some of my favourite wild moorings in the past couple of days, and chosen not to stop at any as I’d have been paddling about yet again, but in reality there are plenty of moorings as it’s now very quiet on the rivers. I didn’t see another boat on the Bure between Ranworth and Horning this morning. 

[kpnut]

And I was told that ludham bridge was reading 7’ yesterday, but I’m not sure what time that was in relation to the tide times. 

[YnysMon]

1 hour ago, kpnut said:

Definitely wellies and if you haven’t got one already, perhaps a piece of rope to attach to a roof rail to help pull yourself up onto the boat (depending of course on its design). 
And lots and lots of dog towels!

The water’s not shifting at the moment. I’m at Horning, arriving dead on low tide and the water was about 2” below the top. Saying that it didn’t really overtop (at the Swan end) while I’ve been here. 
 

Generally, I could say moorings are in short supply - I’ve passed by Womack dyke, St Benets, cockshoot, Horning church and some of my favourite wild moorings in the past couple of days, and chosen not to stop at any as I’d have been paddling about yet again, but in reality there are plenty of moorings as it’s now very quiet on the rivers. I didn’t see another boat on the Bure between Ranworth and Horning this morning. 

We might stay on our home mooring at least part of the week and even if we decide to cruise some days we could decide to go back to our home mooring in Horning before dark.  Ludham Bridge shouldn’t be too much of an issue unless rain is forecast as we only need 6’10” with the canopy down.

[YnysMon]

I heard earlier that this week’s owners on MS have also gone home early, using bin bags to keep their legs dry as they waded across the yard to their car. 

[YnysMon]

Trip 16 November 2023

Friday 10th November

We left home fairly early, well, we would have done if Graham hadn’t mislaid his house keys. Got on our way just after 9.30 and had a untroubled journey to Norfolk, stopping off at our usual La Hogue Farm Shop Café for a late breakfast.

I had been in touch with the marina the previous day to check whether the floods had subsided. They had not.

 

Fortunately, HPC have an area at the rear of their sheds, where we were able to park. Isn't it lucky we had brought our wellies!

I also knew that they had already done the usual turnaround check, so we didn’t have to wait for the usual 5pm takeover time. Just as well. As mentioned in my live blog, we picked up the boat, took her to Boulter’s for a refuel and pump out, given the previous owners had to contend with the full floods and hadn’t managed that.

Boulter's.

After we'd finished in Boulter's Graham waved me off - doing my first ever solo cruise, then he walked back to our car and drove to Ranworth as that was where we were planning to load up the boat with all our stuff.

Ranworth worked out fine. We were able to manoeuvre the trailer through the posts that surround the car park and take it to the stern of the boat, so that was a lot easier than transferring lots of separate items from the car to the boat by foot from the car park at the rear of HPC. Once we’d loaded the boat I still had enough daylight to do the return cruise to HPC. I arrived before Graham, but it wasn’t a problem to moor up by myself.

Some pics from the return journey.

We decided to prioritise doing out food shop next, choosing to do that at Roy’s rather than do the extra journey to the Thorpe Lidl and Sainsbury’s.

After that, getting the dogs onto the boat wasn’t that easy either. Pozzick didn’t want to wade through the water, but had to. Seren got carried.

Dinner this evening was vegetarian cottage pie – leftovers from a meal earlier in the week that I’d frozen. I must do this more often – bring a meal from home so that I don’t have to cook the first evening.

We dug the radiator that’s stored under the sofa out to warm up the saloon. We have brought a second one with us for our cabin, plus under-blankets, so we’ll we toasty as long as we manage to hook up to electric.

There was very little wind this evening, so the marina was very quiet. Such a peaceful night.

 

 

[YnysMon]

Saturday 11th

After a very peaceful night we woke up this morning shortly after dawn. Graham took the dogs out, first Pozzick, then Seren. Seren needed to be carried again to a dry spot before she would relieve herself.

The sun started to come out fitfully, which helped warming the boat up. We had a porridge breakfast and lazed around until mid-morning before we set off.

Cockshoot Dyke - awash.

 

St Benedict's Church staithe - still just about awash.

 

On our way...

 

We had a very leisurely cruise down river as far as Stokesby, passing Kate on Springer’s Retreat just upstream from Upton Dyke. There were masses of swans near Upton Dyke.

 

Unfortunately, there was a boat already moored on the BA moorings at Stokesby and the space left on the moorings wasn’t quite enough for us, so we chugged back upriver to Acle.

Once moored up I made us a brunch: sausage and bacon (vegan versions for Graham) mushrooms, tomato, rosti potato and fried egg. After that we took the dogs for a walk along the river bank, heading upriver. This went really well until they startled a deer and both ran off in pursuit of it. Pozzie gave up quite quickly, but Seren chased the poor creature around a field and then onto the next field. Luckily, she did eventually respond to Graham’s whistle and returned to us.

After that we took them back to the boat.

Graham stayed on board, did the washing up and looked after the dogs whilst I walked to Acle and back. The main object was to go to Co-op to pick up a few extra things that we hadn’t bought in our Roy’s shop the previous day. On a syndicate boat there are usually some staples on board, such as brown sauce, hand soap, washing up liquid. We were running low on some things, and there were a few items we’d forgotten to buy yesterday, hence the walk to Acle.

There are more shops and facilities in Acle than I’d realised. A butcher, hardware shop, and hairdressers, post office, pharmacy, Chinese and Indian takeaways, a couple of cafes, as well as a decent sized Co-op. The pub in the centre of the village (The Kings Head) seems to have reinvented itself as a steak house ‘Acle Steak’.

This evening we just had an early evening sandwich. Now that I’ve retired, we’ve decided to revert to the pattern of meals that our grandparents had – a midday dinner and a lighter supper meal in the evening. Having a heavy meal in the evening doesn’t work for us nowadays, it’s too difficult to digest, especially for Graham with his hiatus hernia.

[floydraser]

1 hour ago, YnysMon said:

There are more shops and facilities in Acle than I’d realised. A butcher, hardware shop, and hairdressers, post office, pharmacy, Chinese and Indian takeaways, a couple of cafes, as well as a decent sized Co-op. The pub in the centre of the village (The Kings Head) seems to have reinvented itself as a steak house ‘Acle Steak’.

Thanks for that info. I checked the King's Head prices - hmmm. Did you know the Co-op do a meal deal for 4 quid? 

I have used the Travelodge at Acle a few times especially in the winter, as it's only 6 miles from my boat. I used to get over Friday after work and have a comfy night to make best use of the limited daylight next day. I did the same the other week as it's still usually only £29 for Sunday night. There's an M&S Food at the service station but I never knew about the Co-op. A lot of places are doing a meal deal (a light lunch) for about £4.

[vanessan]

Can’t believe how high that water is! 

[vanessan]

2 hours ago, YnysMon said:

After that we took the dogs for a walk along the river bank, heading upriver. 

Is your photo the BA moorings side of the river or the Upton side? Looks good walking. 

[Broads01]

Wow, the photos of Cockshoot are striking, Helen.

I've been to the Co-Op at Acle but didn't like it much, to be honest. I found the prices too high.

[SwanR]

Great start to your write up and love seeing your pictures. 

[YnysMon]

3 hours ago, floydraser said:

Thanks for that info. I checked the King's Head prices - hmmm. Did you know the Co-op do a meal deal for 4 quid? 

I have used the Travelodge at Acle a few times especially in the winter, as it's only 6 miles from my boat. I used to get over Friday after work and have a comfy night to make best use of the limited daylight next day. I did the same the other week as it's still usually only £29 for Sunday night. There's an M&S Food at the service station but I never knew about the Co-op. A lot of places are doing a meal deal (a light lunch) for about £4.

Sorry, didn’t notice. We are now regular visitors at Holyhead Travelodge as staying in my father in law’s house has become impossible. It’s so helpful that they accept dogs. 

[YnysMon]

2 hours ago, Broads01 said:

Wow, the photos of Cockshoot are striking, Helen.

I've been to the Co-Op at Acle but didn't like it much, to be honest. I found the prices too high.

Yes, but sometimes needs must.

[YnysMon]

2 hours ago, vanessan said:

Is your photo the BA moorings side of the river or the Upton side? Looks good walking. 

Photo of MS on the BA moorings. We crossed the bridge to walk to Upton, passing the ex Pedro’s.

[YnysMon]

Sunday 12th November

We had a very lazy morning. Porridge for breakfast again this morning, with some blueberries that I’d bought yesterday in the Co-op.

It was very misty first thing, and quite frosty, but the sun soon burned off the mist and the frost.

 

Lazing around. Seren doesn't do a lot of lazing though.

 

Just before 11am we set off with the dogs, crossed the bridge and walked along the southern Bure bank to Upton Dyke...

 

and from there to The White Horse. Kate’s boat Springer’s Retreat was moored at the mouth of Upton Dyke, as we had agreed to meet up for Sunday lunch. When I booked a table for us, I’d mentioned that we would have three dogs with us, so they thoughtfully reserved us the table in the corner near the bar.

We all enjoyed our meals. Kate and I had beef and Graham had their Butternut Squash Wellington, I might look up a recipe for that, and we all had their mini black cherry crumble with custard for pud with tea/coffee. I’ll just say, if that’s the mini version, the full-sized portion must be massive!

One of Finlay and our two:

 

After lunch Kate walked back with us as far as the old Pedro’s basin. Once back on the boat we wasted no time and started off post-haste, as it was already getting on for 3.30. We spotted Kate walking back along the river bank just before Upton Dyke and waved.

 

Sunset was just after 4pm, so by the time we turned down Ranworth Dam the light was starting to fail. Still we had plenty of light from the very cosily lit up Granary Restaurant. It did look welcoming. I was surprised that Ranworth Saithe was devoid of any other boats. Naturally, we bagged ourselves the taxi rank. We didn’t want much to eat this evening having stuffed ourselves lunchtime.