ALL GAS AND GERIATRICS

ALL GAS AND GERIATRICS

We had a super stay at Bradford Upon Avon where we joined the Kennet and Avon Trust (Lots of great folk, a glossy magazine and all for only £17 per year). We stayed on for the Wharf Festival on Sunday 3rd September. There was plenty of room on the 24 hour moorings as only one person was building a boat and only one boat permanently moored there.
We took part in the boat parade, but lack of bunting and noone on the boat who could sing meant my superb steering was ignored by the three blind judges. The prizes and the crowd were scooped by Lucy Locket who had fold away bunting and a statuesque lady on the front singing the boat song. Tried to get Brenda to sing ‘For Mr David’s a Jolly Good Fellow’ but it seems that she was out of tune. I was presented with a bottle of Bucks Fizz for taking part, which allowed me to say I had won something. My apologies to the spectators whose legs I severed along the wharf wall. The National Health Service is a wonderful organization and it will soon have you up on your stumps.
We stayed overnight on the new moorings at Sells Green, great job done by British Waterways, ringed, wooden moorings with a new water point which has the fastest water flow we have seen. We had traveled down with Ed and Julia who boat on Wildflower, the flowers painted by Julia and paid for by Ed. If you get a chance do a few locks with Wildflower, Ed is very energetic and rushes everywhere swinging gates, rising paddles; he tires me out just watching him from my steering position. That evening we ate and drank at the Three Magpies, just eighty metres from the mooring. A little far for me but there is a local taxi firm. Good food, good ale and an audience for my old war stories.
The next day we were ready for the Caen Flight. You know that a day is going to be good when you first bend down to undo the mooring rope and on straightening you bang your head on the steering arm. We delayed the start of the flight so that Tom, Brenda’s, father could join us up the flight, something he has always wanted to do, but sensibly has delayed the trip until he is too old to wind a paddle. Having past bridge 149 we were in a twisty narrow part, when a Working Boat came through Bridge 148 and kept to the center of the cut. I steer into a tree watching the light glinting from shards of blue boat paint, I didn’t move over enough though, still got hit by the Butty. “Sorry” the gaffer said, “Its a bit shallow today”. Indeed it was. In fact every time I pass a working boat the cut is a bit shallow and I end up in the bank; it must be coincidence.
The paddles on the first six locks after Foxhangers are dreadfully stiff, some of the hardest around, therefore I felt obliged to put down the newspaper, get off the boat and help the ladies with the paddles. I hate helping it makes them feel useless and it's hard work. Ed would have normally done it but by this time he had locked ahead to Lock 30. We steadily locked our way up the flight, the crew dancing a ballet around the gates, not opening them quickly, just dancing a ballet. I came up with the cunning wheeze of breaching the boats together and driving them both up the locks. This had the advantage that it appeared I was working hard driving two boats, looking clever and able to charge Ed later for the diesel. The scheme was later sabotaged by a Lock Keeper who said we would get stuck in Lock 38, The Tom Ducy Lock, as it would only take one boat at a time through the gate opening. I took this opportunity to initiate him into my new scheme to bring the gas lights back to the Caen flight. Just picture the summer evenings with the gas lights flickering alongside the locks, or the winter evenings warmed by the golden glow.
“No chance!” he said “I have enough to do already without worrying about gas lamps”. Time will tell; vote now for the Mr David Gas Lights at the Caen Flight, listen to stories of how they will explode and require a safety scheme all their own.
Half way up the flight a lady came bustling up to the lock and asked if we were going up or down, as she wanted her boat to join the single boat a lock behind us. This is the second time in a lock that I have been asked if I am going up or down. Now as I know that most of you cannot steer a boat I will give you a hint here so that you don’t have to ask. The boat will normally being going the way it is pointing, that is, the sharp end at the front. Thus if it is pointing down hill it is going down, unless of course it is a member of the London to Bristol Backwards Boating Club.
I entertained a few gongoozers on the way up displaying my boat handling skills. An aged couple came over and asked if they could hire my boat for the day, it struck me that it is only geriatrics who talk to me on the boat. No young, handsome teenagers - just old folk. I saw a lovely girl the other day, all long poles and jutting fenders but she didn’t want to talk; it’s enough to turn you homosexual. But then I suppose I would be turned down by young men as well as young women!