Snail Speed

original post 13/06/08


No photo's tonight as we only have snail speed connection which kinda matches our snail speed while under way.

We had probably the quietest ever night at Henley, you know, its so quiet that you cant hear anything at all except the noise from your ears.
We woke to spanking sunshine and clear blue sky, By 8am the Henley rowers where out and about practising for next week's ladies Regatta and the Cox's were being rather vociferous....Typical small person syndrome lol.

We Cast off and got under way by 9.30 am hoping to make Goring for the evening stop. River flow's were still causing us problems, sometimes managing 3mph other times dropping right down to 1.8 on the narrows. The river was quiet again untill we approached Shiplake lock and two boats hove into view behind us who were obviously stemming the flow better than ourselves...One was a Thames widebeam cruiser and the other a narrowboat, I presume the Narrowboats are either giving it full wellie on the engines (which im not prepared to do) or they have larger props suitable for river cruising.

We enterd Shiplake lock first and were joined alongside by a Nb (Mention no names). No drama in the lock, and we intended to pull over on the left to take on water and empty the toilet cassette.
Due to our starter problem I said to the chap on the Nb that he may like to go first, He said that there were stopping for the pump out in any case....I went below on the opening of the gates and Lady Elgar kicked into life with the magic wire on the first go. I returned topside to see the Nb already out of the lock. We followed them to the Pump out and Water point mooring. The Nb promptly pulled in alongside the Pump out and I expected them to pull back to allow us to use the water point.....no such luck. He secured his tail rope and she secured her rope at the front.....she then walked upto the water hose and fed it back the 30' to their boat....so they obviously intended to pump out and fill up at the smae time, knowing full well that we also required water and couldve done this while they pumped out. Never mind, we plodded on as there was insufficient room in front of them for us....I wasnt overly bothered but it did seem to annoy Nora......Its just uncivil thats all......
By comparison......we approached the Tesco mooring at Reading and every space was full apart from a very tight gap I thought i might be able to slide into on the very end....Full marks to the Chap and lady inboard NB Cygent who came outside and pulled their boat back to give us full length on the mooring. Civil an decent...dont take much does it.

We eventually spent a couple of hours at Reading, While shopping at Tesco I put the Genny on and we did some washing while wandering round the store. Upon our return the wash cycle was just finishing and we turned round and took on 54.5 litres of Diesel at Reading marina also water and empty the elsen.

We then made all haste for Goring which should only have been 3 hours away.We texted Neil and Kath our neighbours at Iver on Herbie that our ETA at Goring was appx 7pm, well, 7pm came and went and we eventually ariived and were met on the tow path at 8pm.....Neil and Kath had already done a recce on the moorings and found all the ones below the lock taken but he guided us into a nice little spot a little way back with two trees placed perfectly for our bow and strn lines.

The four of us then wandered into Goring and plonked ourselves in the first pub where 3 ales on pump attracted our attention.
We had a really smashing evening and were really pleased that they met us but as always the evening went too quick.
Tomorrow will hopefully see us in Abingdon and a rendevous with Bones and Maffi, Ill pm then after this to make sure all is as planned.

As an aside, we shared a lock with some young folk on a Thames hireboat...The two chaps were dressed up in naval getout. The chap in the admiral hat told me that he lived in a little village alongside the kennet and Avon Canal, he said that LE was the best looking canal boat he had ever seen......Makes ya kinda proud of your home.