Battered boats and cleaning up

With just a handful of miles to get back to the marina, we had yet another lie-in – I feel so very spoilt, especially with a fresh coffee on hand when I woke up.

Mother concentrated on cleaning the boat, while father and I hunted for kingfishers (none to be seen today), and worked the locks.

Of note was a boat looking a little battered and run aground, or perhaps just badly positioned, whose rear gear had failed before going into a lock - we were next in the queue going uphill. A boat coming downhill offered to pull it backwards but the battered boat’s ropes were too short to throw. In conversation neither the husband nor the wife that lived aboard, a mature couple, were entirely on planet Earth – the husband was probably somewhere in orbit, while the wife clearly came from a completely different solar system.

The boat behind us had been following the battered boat for a couple of days and reported both erratic steering and erratic speech, their only saving grace, that they kept apologising to all the boats they hit.

We returned to the marina, and mother continued cleaning while father painted, pumped and preened the boat, and I busied myself updating missive and reading a book. Oh, and also emptied the Dyson hoover, which was very difficult and complicated and took at least ten minutes including the trip to the skip via the ladies’ loo.

Father went to fetch the hire car that we will use to get home tomorrow, while mother and I watched a movie and had Pimms. Which has gone to my head.