Some stuff about the boat.......

Well, it'll make a nice change, won't it?

I mean, this is supposed to be a boater's blog.........

Although those familiar with it will know too well it is naught but random wibblings.

(I state the otherwise bleedin' obvious by way of a warning to those who have strayed into this nonsense by accident........)

Anyway, an Alvis-free post it is going to be.

Likewise, it will be free of links to popular beat combos, any references to art,  and furthermore, any cinema or theatre reviews.

(There may be a 'cute cat' shot in there somewhere, but then these are more or less mandatory under the latest E.U. quota system.........)

For, on Saturday, we went boating!

T'was a cold and frosty morning:

For some unaccountable reason, the solar panels weren't working that well......

We moored up on the bank between Horningsea and The Bridge at Clayhithe to gather some of the recently pollarded willow wood.

Long lengths formed a natural bridge over which the shorter stuff was carried.

We then pulled the 'bridge' in after us and put it all on the roof for the trip up the Cam to Engineer Mark's mooring upstream of Bait's Bite Lock.

He wasn't in at the time, but we dropped off the timber on a handily empty pallet then scarpered.

(Actually, we did ask him first...........I caught up with him at the lock near our mooring the previous day when he was helping get widebeam 'Resolute' to a boat yard, viz:

That'll be him in the bows, the silhouette giving him an uncanny resemblance to an outsize mushroom vent.......

Mark and Sheena have decided to move closer to Mark's new place of work in the Midlands, so their boat 'Norweigan Blue' is up for sale. Check out Apollo Duck if you are interested.... But he reckons the wood will be safe until next March, by which time my wood shed will be conveniently empty.......)

Heat from the stove begins to clear the frost......

Not an affectation of any piratical airs: the low sun and glare off the roof and the water meant the only way to see ahead was out of the left eye across the bridge of the nose.......

Tricky........

Just before Baits Bite lock

We dropped off the wood and carried on into Cambridge, where did the necessary pump out. James and Amy from Severner Willow dropped in to join us for a cup of tea and some toast before we turned around and headed back for home.

The late afternoon winter light was extraordinary.

 The Dutch Barge "Trio II", (Eh?........) moored at the site of the now demolished Penny Ferry pub.

Jackie well wrapped up and at the Tiller.

And finally, the now mandatory (under E.U. directive 467001/9a), Cute Cat Shot.

More Alvis news, with an in depth recounting of repairs to the oil feed pipe next time.

Be still, your beating hearts......

At Last! The soundtrack!

It is important, I feel, in life, to be aware of the need for a decent soundtrack.

Pity then, all you youngsters, us older types who's early 1970's soundtrack featured the likes of Mudd, Showaddywaddy and The Bay City Rollers........

Good grief.

Yes I know NOW that there were groups like Focus, Cream, King Crimson, etc etc etc but way back then, when you were nine years old and had to rely on 70p per quarter (of a year) church choir pay to keep you in Airfix kits and Hornby 'OO', there wasn't a lot left over for the purchase of new gramophone records.......

Which is why I got a lot of stuff either second hand from jumble sales or found in actual tea chests, (remember them?), in the attic.

Aged 10, I remember having a distinctly 78rpm groove-thang going down.........

Boy, was I one rockin' kid............

It must have had a fairly profound and long lasting effect on my taste in music, though.

(Some might say that the music of the aforementioned Mudd, Slade, The Sweet, Showaddywaddy and The Bay City Rollers et al, had given me a sort of acoustic version of PTSD..............

It explains a lot.........)

Anyway, we recently stumbled upon this, the sort of sound that, along with Pink Martini, I would be happy to have as the soundtrack to our lives........ especially on long, warm summer evening drives in a certain 1948 Alvis TA14 dhc.........

This is Scott Bradlee and The Post Modern Jukebox featuring Kate Davis.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyTTX6Wlf1Y

I think they are utterly brilliant.

:-)