Sunday 17 May 2015

A Fortnight of catch up.

It’s been two weeks since our last “canal kick” when we attended the Canal Cavalcade in Little Venice. The often visited lovely Isle of Wight was our destination last weekend when ……….

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…… we went to friend Jonathan’s birthday BBQ. A great time was had in his very windy cliff top garden. Lighting the BBQ in the face of a westerly gale was an achievement in itself!

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A quick hop back from the Isle of Wight on Sunday had us in Southampton and meeting cruise friends Lance and Vanessa. We had a very nice al fresco meal on the waterfront with the fantastic backdrop of “Queen Victoria” at Ocean Terminal. 

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Later in the afternoon we retired to the Duke of Wellington.  The building has original foundations and cellars from the 12th century when it was called The Bere House. It took on its present name after the Battle of Waterloo and we love quaffing the occasional pint surrounded by its lovely old timbers.

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Last week Doug’s parents, Derek and Vilma, popped up from Devon for a few days and we had some splendid moments with them. Selsey came up trumps as usual and provided some lovely sunshine.

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Selsey’s had more important coastal defence work carried out recently, claiming back some 12 feet in this case and halting some rapid erosion.

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We enjoyed a pre theatre meal in Prezzo before seeing Alan Ayckbourn’s, Way Upstream at the Chichester’s Festival Theatre ……

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…… where the most extraordinary set greeted us when we arrived. A boat floating on a lake with a forest behind!

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The boat moved around the lake and we had thunder, lightning and rain!

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And talking of boats – here we are today (Saturday) on ours. “Chance” is finally out of winter moth balls and starting to shake off the awful fur coat that’s grown on the hull over the last few months.

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Heading down towards Brentford to get onto the Thames tomorrow we found the lock flight at Hanwell with all the bottom gates open and paddles up! Although we had to work twice as hard as we might have done it was sunny and warm and Asylum Lock was as atmospheric as always.

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