Cheers,
It was truly a wonderful experience being in London. We made friends, saw incredible places, enjoyed walks along the Thames and into the funky places of Whitechapel and Shoreditch. Tower Hill to Charing Cross was a favorite walk for us too. I loved my Toynbee Hall Life Drawing group and the welcome of the Friends of St Katharine Docks. The cruising community was small but collegial and everyone learned from each other and shared their favorite places. Leila at the Turks Head Café welcomed us like old friends and members of the neighborhood. I admit to shedding a few tears when Coleen and I had our last afternoon tea. She and I had spent many months of Sundays together walking and laughing our way to and from Toynbee Hall. And I got to meet a cousin, Pam for the first time. And the Janes and my other art friend Lucy…. And of course our time with Singkey and meeting her teacher Jessica. But this is starting to sound like an Academy Awards speech so I’ll stop, probably forgetting to mention people we met and enjoyed. I still have lots of London stories and maybe one day will catch up with them. In the meantime we’ve already started to collect Ipswich stories.
And it’s baseball season! Go Red Sox!
Ru
Passage to Ipswich
It’s hard to believe we’re no longer in London. Maybe that’s because we’re still in England. Ipswich has a population of 133,400 and London has over 8 million but High Street Ipswich today felt just as crowded. Lots of lovely interesting things to see and do while we are here. Mary and Rick are great guides as they wintered here on their boat 2 years ago.
We left London about 10:30 am Thursday and stopped overnight at Queenborough. About 6 am Friday, we untied our lines from the Queenborough floating barge and set off for Ipswich. It was a long 10 hour passage with some rolling bits, but mostly quite calm. We had a crew of 6. Our Marmaris friends Rick and Mary Munden are with us for a few weeks. Wynn Jones and Michael Smith came along too. Each is just beginning to explore diesel trawlers so Randal invited them along.
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Our London friends Rick, Susie, Jane and David came to see us off as well as our cruising friends Ed and Sue and Al and Sally |
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Michael watching as Randal backs out of the slip. Rick is taking some photos as we pass out of the West Basin under the raised blue pedestrian bridge. |
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Leaving the west basin and aiming for the lock just past the open red pedestrian bridge. Both bridges had to be raised for us to get to the lock that we would go through to get into the Thames. |
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Jane taking a photo and Randal saying “see you somewhere down the Thames.” Wynn in the yellow jacket is watching and learning. We’re all waiting for the water level in the lock to lower to the level in the Thames which was at high tide. You can only enter and exit the marina at high tide so must time your arrival and departures accordingly. |
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One last look back at the Tower Bridge |
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Michael sitting up on the fly bridge with Randal… A far cry from the sleveless shirts and shorts of the Med or Tropics… We needed hats and gloves and heavy jackets. |
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Mary, Rick and Wynn stand in the cockpit as we get one last look behind at the familiar landmarks of Tower Bridge, the Shard, Gherkin and Walkie Talkie. |
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Mary in the galley whipping up some maple-bacon scones! |
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Wynn and Rick as we cast off our lines from the floating barge where we’d tied up for the night in Queenborough on the Swale, an estuary off the Medway River. |
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We pulled up just after this fishing boat so they got our planned spot but then came and caught our lines so it all worked out. Actually rather than catching fish, the boat was harvesting seaweed for aquariums. |
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Morning on the Swale as the sun is just beginning to rise. |
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Locking in at Ipswich Mary and Wynn and Randal |
