Sunday 6th May 2007 saw a huge articulated lorry, driven by Ian Harrison (pegasus), being reversed into the entrance to St John's Lock. Quite how Ian managed to get that beast in there without demolishing anything is a miracle to me!
Large numbers of dinghies of differing
shapes and sizes, including outboard motors were then hauled out of the water
and stacked upon said lorry for transportation to Cricklade.
Everyone then piled into whatever transport was available to be taken to the
launch site. Thank you to the chauffeurs.
As forecast the rain began to fall as soon as we got out of the car but being hardy boaters we ignored it. Ian duly arrived shortly afterwards with the lorry and the dinghies were swiftly unloaded. The biggest surprise was to see where we were to launch the boats....... there was about 6 inches of water!!! Never mind, get the girls in and us ruffty tuffty blokes will get our feet wet!
Anyway after lots of pushing, shoving and towing we all set off down river! It soon became apparent that engines were not going to be much use as they spent most of the time dragging along the river bottom! So oars it had to be which was probably just as well considering the obstacles that had to be negotiated as you will see from the pictures. Speaking of obstacles it appears that Toby Stanton (Anatolia) hit an obstacle in the form of Geoff Dickinson (Aquacadabra) who, rumour has it, tied the bow line of poor Toby's kayak to a tree. Not too much of a problem you might think except it was just too high for Toby to reach!
After about 3 hours we eventually sighted civilization in the form of a pub. Being 'tail end charlies' there wasn't a lot of room left for us to moor outside the pub and it was even more difficult to climb from the dinghy up onto the bank (nothing to do with age and stiff limbs of course!). Poor John and Joan Douse (Stealer) had to beach themselves on the opposite bank and make their way through knee high (to John anyway) grass etc then climb a wall to get to the pub!
After a very nice Sunday roast and half pint of shandy we managed to get back in the boats for the second half. The water was getting deeper now and the river wider so engines were put to good use for the remainder of the
trip down to Lechlade.
We eventually arrived (last as usual) back at St. John's lock cold, tired, hungry and dying for a cuppa at around 5 O'clock I think.
It was a VERY well organised trip thanks to Steve Grafton, Ian Harrison, Peter Payne (St Johns Lock Keeper) all the chauffeurs and everyone else involved. Next time though Steve could you organise a bit better weather?
Dennis & Jill Hill Click here for pictures of the day