Summer In The City

Hot days, mild nights and London’s population is spilling onto the pavements, music from open windows, a constant stream of people along the towpath.  Fake grass on roofs seems a popular feature of boats around here, after a days work the boat dwellers can relax on the lawn with a chilled glass of wine.

Across the canal on a bench sit three twenty-something blokes wearing shorts, their legs stretched out if front of them discussing who has the hairiest legs. ‘I think Andy’s legs are hairier than mine’

‘Maybe but if Andy stands up you’ll see his calves are bald.’  Andy stands up and does a twizzle. ‘Whereas both yours and mine are hairy all the way round.

I get thrown off my mooring at Paddington Basin because there is going to be dragon boat racing.  When I wander passed later another boat has taken my place and all the inside moorings are full again.  That’s not fair.

Dragon boat racing

I arrange to meet my daughter and her friend at Oxford Circus to visit the Photographer’s Gallery in Ramillies Street.  It is not a good idea to meet anybody at Oxford Circus without specifying which underground exit to meet at.  It is an even worse idea to leave your mobile phone back on the boat.  Eventually we find each other.  The exhibition on the third floor has a parental guidance warning at the entrance.  Clare decides that this means it is not a suitable exhibition to take a parent to, far too embarrassing to look at lewd pictures with her mother alongside, she suggests I wait outside.

The uniforms of sport extend to the spectators. We’re near Lords Cricket Ground, in the evening  men in straw boaters and MCC ties stagger, red faced towards Paddington Station, in the other direction white shirted fans with red stripes on their faces stagger towards the pubs in readiness for the England World Cup Game.

I’m the party boat this weekend.  On Saturday Clare, Marc and five friends come along for a ride, on Sunday it’s four friends a little girl and a baby plus a short visit from Clare to say hello.  I do more sweeps of Regents Park, Maida Vale and Camden Lock than the tour boats, when we’ve passed each other a dozen times they’re starting to scowl at me because they think I must be touting for their customers along this stretch of canal.  It’s a lottery finding a place to moor where I can join the passengers for dinner and let them disembark and return to their transport, but the fight for mooring spaces seems to have abated this weekend and there is plenty of room to tie up when I arrive back from each of the grand tours.

This morning I take the empties to the bottle bank.  There is a lot of them. I have to make a couple of trips, the local drinkers, who spend their days propped up against the refuse disposal area, are now treating me with a lot more respect, they obviously recognise a kindred spirit.  One more trip to the bottle bank and I will be invited to be part of their gang.

Yesterday evening I moored against two boats, this morning a sixty footer a few boats in front of me left so I decided to quickly grab the space before somebody else came along. Put shoes on, started the engine, untied set off and moored up neatly, tied up.  Then went inside and found I’d left the tap in the bath running (was planning on soaking a wine stained table-cloth).  Full bath = empty water tank plus a drain on my newly charged batteries when I have to run the pump for an age to empty the bath. 
Now I’m moored against the towpath I have no excuse for not cleaning the extremely murky windows.

Going Home

I moved from Camden because I was going to leave the boat for a few days and I’d have over-stayed if I remained there.  I was aiming for Paddington Basin because it seems a safe place to leave a boat. I watered at Little Venice then reversed passed the restaurant boat and started to turn where the tour boat is moored, two Japanese tourists frantically waved tickets at me, they must have thought I was the tour boat leaving without them.  Toyed with the idea of picking them up and charging a fortune for taking them on a trip alongside Regents Park but as I could see boats at the other water-point and heading down the canal I thought I might lose any available slots in the basin. A wise move.  I headed a flotilla into the basin, made a pigs ear of turning against a strong wind and snaffled the last available place.  The rest of the flotilla turned and went on their way.

Went to Peterborough and collected my car from yet another garage where it was supposedly being repaired. Hopefully it will work properly this time if it doesn’t I’m going to park it in the canal next to my boat. Then it was back home to Barnwell, except now only my heart remains in Barnwell my home is waiting patiently for me in Paddington.

Home... but I'm not there 

But at least the natives are still friendly

                   

 

 

  

 

 

I was planning on going back to go to the BBQ and Barn Dance which was to be held at the cruising club but in the meantime I got a better offer, a post-nuptial dinner at the Talbot Hotel in Oundle.  I weighed it up carefully, burgers in a bun or choice of the Talbots menu and my stomach decided there was no contest.  I went into the club first and when they were just getting organised and it looked like a good evening was in the offing
 

 

 

Then went to meet the happy couple at the hotel

 





 

 I think I must have just seen the prices on the menu

Then it was back to the club for a night cap.  Too late to join in the dancing but it looked as if they had had a good time.

 

 

 

 



Where am I?

I awake to the mewing of herring gulls, look out of my window to see a life-size sculpture of a cow, nearby I can hear a peacock calling.  In my early morning daze I’m not sure if I’m in Brixham, Milton Keynes or the garden of a stately home.  Then a police siren blasts out and a train passes by and by the time the children are noisily amassing in the school behind the high wall next to me I remember that I am in Camden.

Probably the most photographed cow in the country

I had visitors yesterday, the plan, if there was anything that resembled  a plan, was to set off and go along a bit and stop for lunch and turn round and come back to Little Venice.  Silly idea really, I should have remembered I’m not on a river where turning is simple or a countryside canal where mooring is easy or somewhere quiet where it is possible to get the same mooring space you’d left a few hours ago.  Firstly it took me an age to find somewhere to turn (I wimped out at reversing a quarter of a mile down the canal), then a lovely cruise along Maida Vale and Regents Park followed, but it was impossible to find somewhere to stop for lunch.  My friend seemed to be under the impression that narrowboats either bent or concertinaed up or that it didn’t matter about mooring against ‘No Mooring’ signs or peoples back gardens.

’Look stop there ’  How do I tie up against concrete?

‘Look there’s a ring on that wall there ’ It’s ten foot higher than me how do I get a rope in there?

‘Look can’t you pull up where that waterbus has just left’   No.

‘Can’t you tie up to that tree, we could put the table out on the grass’  I think it’s the American Ambassadors residence, they’d probably shoot us

 

They bought themselves an ice-cream but didn't offer me one

 

Eventually arriving at Camden Lock I decided to turn instead of going through the locks and chance my luck at an odd space amongst the visitor moorings.  I could just about get in but because it was across an inset I let the visitors off with the ropes and asked them to pull me in.  A man from the boat in front came along and took over, shouting instructions to them.  As they were taking more notice of him than me I left him to it.  Tied up, switched the engine off and it wouldn’t switch off.  Tried again and again to switch the engine off but it was determined to keep going.  Called to helpful man to help and he came over.  He was helpful but didn’t know much more about engines than me, but kept going back to his friend ‘the mechanic ‘ for tips, eventually ‘the mechanic’ left his cold beer and came over fiddled a bit and stopped the engine.  At this point I decided this was a lovely mooring and I was going to stay, chances of finding gaps in Little Venice were unlikely anyway and I needed a drink.

 

 

View to the right of me            

    View to the left of me

Later that evening when the riff raff had left I went into the back to lock up and saw my battery warning lights were flashing red.  I realised that although the engine was switched off the ignition key was still turned on, I switched it off, switched it back on and zilch happened.  I called somebody who knows more about these things than me (I could probably have dialled a number at random and still got somebody who knew more than me).   He suggested fiddling with the knob the man had fiddled with when he stopped the boat and then trying to re-start the engine.  I said it was too dark down there and I might disturb the neighbours and it was better if I did that in the morning. In all honesty it was more to do with wanting to get back to my good book than for any of the other reasons.  This morning everything works OK.  My battery indicators are showing green, the engine starts and the engine stops.

So there we are, in times of dire mechanical failure, don’t do anything just go to bed with a good book and by the following morning everything will have sorted itself out.

 

Down among the dead

I’ve been read the blogs about what other boaters get up to in London.  The shows, restaurants, late nights out in Soho, all sounded too much like fun and hard work to me so instead of emulating them I went to a cemetery.  In the rain.

  

I want angels on my headstone. 
I think they would be an appropriate comment on the life I have lived
 

Highgate Cemetery is tranquil and beautiful, an interesting juxtaposition of old and new, spruced up in parts and overgrown in others.  It’s in the centre of the city yet it is an oasis of peace.  It’s an invigorating climb up Highgate Hill, full of Victorian commemorative architecture, flowers and birds and dead people. I was fascinated by it and next time I will go early enough for the conducted tour of the Western Cemetery and spend more time browsing the Eastern Cemetery. http://highgatecemetery.org/

 

I would have loved to have looked closer and longer but the bell rang for closing and as much as I loved the place and have no belief in ghouls and ghosts I didn’t fancy being shut in for the night.

 

The grave of Douglas Adams.  I do hope that the pens admirers have left for him inspire him to write in the after-life because I do love his books and it will give me something to read when I get there.



This grave surprised me, mainly because I didn't know that Jeremy Beadle had died

What more is there to say?

 

 

In Little Venice

Being a good rule-abiding sort of person (sometimes) I moved from my mooring in Paddington Basin when my seven days were up.  I was told that although the boats moored were checked every day, both in Paddington and Little Venice, the mooring limits of seven and fourteen days were rarely enforced.  I was also told by the helpful lady in the C & RT office that there had been a lot of movement in Little Venice so it was a good time to try and find a space so I decided I'd move.

I think I might add an extra level to Rea

I first tried to squeeze Rea’s sixty foot into a fifty five foot space, that didn’t work.  Then I moored alongside two shorter boats, getting into a tangle with ropes and the wood on the roof of one boat.  I had difficulty getting the back platform level with the stern of the other boat.  Sometimes doing simple things like tying up in line when single handed are more difficult than steering round weirs and negotiating into small tight spaces.  Tie up the front tightly and the back is sticking out, loosen the front and tighten the back and the front is in the wrong place.  It’s a bit like sawing bits off the legs off a chair to balance it without measuring anything properly.  In the end I left it secure but wobbly and did a leap of faith from the inside boat to mine, vowing to always come home sober and always to be careful.  Yesterday I noticed the lovely young man next door had re-tied me threading my ropes through his boat so now my access is far less hazardous.

I’m moored opposite expensive house boats and a smart floating restaurant, judging by the smell their signature dish is fish and chips (don’t they know fish and chips should only be eaten on a harbour wall, with a north wind howling around).  I look at them and at the beautiful Georgian terrace behind.  They pay a lot of money to look out at the motley collection of boats opposite, mainly unkempt live-aboards.  Yesterday a Viking ship went passed, all blowing horns and helmets, and made a special effort to blow their horns in the face of the diners.  They were followed by a cruiser full of the local alchis who also drove close to the diners, shouting words of encouragement.  I hope that, even if the neighbours are a bit dodgy, the food is good.

The lovely young man was complaining about the tourists, he was sunning himself on the stern when two Japanese ladies leant across him to take a picture of the interior of his boat, clicked away merrily, then went on their way ignoring him completely.

 

I like it here.