Another work day for me today. I put my model together and worked my way through the scenes. The colours I’ve used work well with just about every scene, I may just change the shade of pink I’ve used in the kitchen scene. Second coats could go on to everything and by the evening it was looking pretty good, it now looks like panto. Still a few days work left to do before I can hand it over.
A sneaky peek of Panto
Mick headed off to find a hardware shop. The washer on the cap for the water intake has expanded, making it hard to put it back on. So he returned with two to try and a set of new bits for a screw driver. In the set is a square headed one, which we’re hoping will mean we can now take off the back of the freezer drawer.
Mick’s personal ferry
Then he headed off to make use of his 60+ oyster again. Today he headed first to Canada Water via the tube and southwards on the overground via Clapham Junction. Then on to Greenwich. Here he considered climbing up to the top of the Dome, but at £30 he felt that was a bit steep and the view wouldn’t be anywhere near as good as that from the Harbour bridge in Sydney.
Thank you
So instead he spent £2 and caught the ferry Predator 2 across the Thames to Trinity Buoy Wharf. This only took around five minutes, but he had the boat to himself. He’d remembered about the ferry from when we came to visit my friend Kathy a couple of years ago in one of the galleries at the wharf.
Greenwich and a big boat
Greenwich and a fast boat
Next was a bus to Canary Wharf, then DLR to Island Gardens where he watched big boats go past on the Thames, before returning back to Oleanna.
A busy day all round, except for Tilly. She has taken to sleeping until around 2:30pm, then she has a period of shouting at the back door before giving up and having to visit her box in the bathroom. A quick check at what I’ve been doing all day, by sticking her head right into my model box. Luckily she approves.
Excerpt from 9th September 1943
This evening I have started to scan my Dad’s diaries from the mid 1940’s. I only have two (I suspect that’s all he wrote) which cover his life from the age of 18 in York, then onto when he joined the army and training camps. The last few entries cover his journey across the seas to India where he rebuilt bridges around Hyderabad after the end of WW2. I’m wanting to try and collate his diaries, with letters, photos and his drawings at some point. Passing them on to Andrew to read has spurred me into action.
My Dad (central) at the age of 19 140th RE (Field) OCTU 175 Class April 1944
0 locks, 0 miles, 4 tubes, 2 overground trains, 1 ferry, 1 bus, 2 DLR, 1 back room den, 3 portals, 1 floor, 1 backdrop completed, 52 pages scanned, 1 cat saving up all her shore leave to have in one big go.
One boat pulled out from the pontoon at 8am this morning, the boat next to them pulled across so as to reduce the amount of footfall directly outside their window. The first GoBoat filled with Japanese tourists went past at just gone 9am, no popping of presecco corks on that boat. The world was waking up around us.
A bit more rain overnight
The yellow water tank needed sorting and thanks to Tilly the boat floor really needed a wash this morning! We had a good tidy up and then Mick headed back to Little Venice on a bike with recycling and the yellow water for disposal. The custodian of the bins was still on duty. With fewer feet about the place I gave Oleanna’s cabin floor a good wash down.
The forecast had been for lower temperatures today, but it still seemed quite warm. To make sure we didn’t get hypothermia I popped the oven on for a couple of hours to roast a couple of small chickens.
Chickens
Kath and Sean arrived for Sunday lunch. We haven’t seen Sean for some time, he’s been working when we’ve arranged a meet up. Today, as the weather this last week has been so good, he had a day off. He is a sound engineer and has been working at Wimbledon, no rain meant no play today so he had a day off.
Sean Kath and Mick about to dive in
We had a lovely afternoon with them, chatting and eating. The handy M&S next door meant that we could have some ice cream with our strawberries and raspberries despite not having a working freezer at the moment.
A Pride green wall garden
After filling our bellies we had a walk up to Little Venice before returning to the boat. Kath and Sean had come by car so that they could pick up a couple of boxes of Geraghty history we’d brought back from the house. They had been fortunate as the nearest parking space to our mooring had been available and free on Sundays, so there wasn’t far to stagger with the boxes.
Mid afternoon our nearest neighbour pulled out, Motor Boat Willow. For two years they worked at Bollington Wharf on the Macclesfield but when they had a baby earlier this year they decided to head south. Tilly now has a better view out of the windows, but there is no longer Thea the cat to stare at.
Bye Bye Willow
The title of todays blog? Several boats have come down into the basin today, most of them local boats looking for their next mooring. One such boat spotted the two free spaces on the pontoon and was starting to reverse back into one of them, he then saw the sign. As he moved his boat away he said to Mick ‘Shiny Boat Central!’ Followed by how nice it was to see such boats in Paddington. Just before dark another boat arrived and pulled in to an available space,they looked shiny too!
I don’t know what they were on about, I’m not missing anything! Everything is here right next to my boat along with me and I’m making the most of it.
I’m not missing!
My feline charms worked wonders this morning. I persuaded them that they needed another day off from moving the outside. She said that if She had a good day today, then until She got her box back She’d have run out of things to do for Puss In Boots. The big slidey board came out and I was told my assistance wasn’t required today.
Title block
Tom got the black box that spits things out out. Instead of feeding it today he showed it things, lots of yellow paper. He didn’t look like he needed my assistance either so I was redundant from boat duties, so made the most of this outside even more.
Outside was quieter today, no music, which meant I could hear friends in the friendly cover easier. Trees needed climbing and from up high I could watch the occasional boat coming past. One was called NB Wand’ring Bark. Now is that the sort of Woofer Bark or Tree Bark I wonder, the latter would be best.
Wandering Bark and The Jam Butty
Then there was this family who came past. The children took quite a bit of interest in me, ‘Look Mum, it’s the missing cat!’ ‘Do you think so’ ‘Yes’. As I said earlier I’m not missing anything! They watched me and then started to follow me, making it hard for me to get back to Oleanna.
Horus. Hope he’s being very busy
She came out and asked about the cat they’d seen, did it have a white tip to it’s tale? Of course I did! She said sorry but that I wasn’t the missing cat. That cat has a lot more white and only one eye and looks nothing like me at all. The children were a bit disappointed but I was then able to carry on with my business undisturbed.
Tom had to go and get them some ding ding as they’d run out of fresh supplies. I offered to catch them some and even suggested they try the Shrimp and Plaice ding ding that I don’t like, but they weren’t too keen on either. Tom doesn’t like things that eat pooh. She calls them crustaceans which makes them sound rather nice and crunchy, but believe me they are not and are really rather yucky!
A boat came along, She popped her head out and suggested they tied up the outside in front of us, it is deeper there. I didn’t think it was trying to get away, but another boat holding it would be better.
0 locks, 0 miles, 9 hours, 1 afternoon kip, 36 trees, 5 friends, 23 showings, 10 sheets, 1st letter opened, 0 left for She to do, 0 other cats, 0 missing cats, only 1 cat, me!
PS She says hello to the people who thought they’d still been following us, but then everything stopped. Tom and She think people were still getting the blog from the old blog, somehow! Tom turned something off the other day which meant the old blog couldn’t be nosy anymore. We are all glad that you’ve found us again, although it looks like Ali hasn’t and She doesn’t want to get told off when She next sees her. Thank you Aileen you helped us sort it. She will write to you about Houdini’s’ transition to life on board, She thinks I’d give a very biased view that wouldn’t be helpful.
Not too warm when we woke this morning, we were in shade from the park trees. However we knew it wouldn’t last.
By 11am the sun was starting to hit the bow of the boat, then crept its way along the roof and cabin side for the next three or four hours before the shade caught back up with it. Mick took the opportunity of the cooler hours to head off into Watford for a newspaper and a loaf of bread for me. The thought of baking a loaf with 30 degree temperatures just wasn’t appealing. So we enjoyed a poached egg and mushrooms on toast for a late breakfast. Sorry Ade and Aileen but I finished it too quickly!
All gone
Most cats in high temperatures tend to stretch out on a cool surface and spend hours doing very very little. Quite wise really.
Tilly however only stopped for two short breaks all day! The doors opened before 9am and were finally shut after 8pm. When I say open, you’d think we had a nice breeze through the boat, well except once Tilly is out the doors get closed to stop her from returning with friends. But with the side hatch facing the canal that could stay open, we also removed one of our windows and risked opening the off side cratch and left the front door open. None of this created a breeze but luckily our crew numbers didn’t increase.
Mick in the shade of the trees
Most of the day was spent reading. I had a script to read, very good it was too. Mick pulled out a file from one of the boxes we’d brought back from Scarborough. Information sent by a relative in Australia about his family. This confirmed what we already knew about Phillip Chignell being born in Leighton Buzzard on Lake Street, but sadly gave him no more information. He has a lot of scanning to do before he hands over the boxes to Kath, his sister, for safe keeping and her research.
New with the old
I’d wanted to do some technical drawings today, but sweaty hands and tracing paper don’t go together. So I remade my portals to new dimensions that they will be built to. Using stock scenery as a base, we’ll be building the curved sections. To make them strong enough, they can’t just be screwed onto the existing flats, especially the bits that meet the floor, so I have extended them. This also gave me chance to have a go at simplifying the painted design on them. In the process I realised I’d missed a trick, so that was well worth doing in the 28 plus heat.
HOT at 15:36
0 locks, 0 miles, 2 hot boaters, 1 very VERY busy cat, 1909 Newport, 1872 Leighton Buzzard, 2 poached eggs, 1 newspaper, 1 loaf bread, 5 moving boats, 1 noisy park, 34.7 in the pram, 28.7 inside.
Mick was up and off early again this morning to return the car. On his journey he picked up a red pepper so that we could have a pasta salad tonight as we hadn’t quite made up our minds what to do today.
Morning view
We could carry on towards London only having used two of our three nights in the marina, meaning we’d arrived that bit sooner.
Or we could stay another night and do our best to use up the £11.09 that had been left on the electric by washing and drying as much as possible. This would also mean I’d be able to do some work.
Drawn by my Dad in 1941 when he was 16
An advantage of being moored bow end in, was that it would give us the ideal opportunity to fix the second bow fender in position. Doing this without touching up the blacking on the (for want of the proper term) bow post first would just be silly. So I risked having the grumpiest of grumpy men for a second day in a row, I delegated the prep to Mick!
In the future this may prove to have been an unwise thing to do, preparation being the most important thing. Scrapping off any loose paint, giving it a sand and then applying some Fertan, how hard can that be?! I learnt in our early days together that decorating and Mick do not mix. He’d been feeling guilty at me decorating our bedroom so had offered to lend a hand. I got him sanding the skirting boards. This was either a total mistake on my part or his plan all along, so as never to be given such a job again!
That just
needs to be
I worked on technical drawings for panto as Mick sanded etc. Tilly was either lending a hand behind my drawing board or shouting at the back door to go out. Here there are too many unexpected cars and far too many places to hunt for her should she fall in, but she doesn’t see it that way.
on the
floor!
An Ocado shop was put in action, they seem to sell most of the gluten free flours that I use and have been running low on, so it made sense to shop with them. We’ll have to stop for a few things on our way though. Sainsburys sells the only odour control cat litter that isn’t obnoxious to our noses, we should be able to moor close enough to stock up with some and a few boxes of wine in a day or twos time.
Portal drawings one on top of the other
With the weather being warmer I risked washing off the Fertan and once it was dry I applied a coat of blacking to the bow post. This should be dry by morning so that the fenders can go on.
One load of washing is left for the morning and the washing drawer will then be empty. Just about everything will be dry having used the tumble drier as much as we could, you’re not allowed to hang washing out in the marina! Will we run out of electric? Tune in tomorrow to find out.
0 locks, 0 miles, 4 sheets drawings, 1 stomping She, 3 pens retrieved from the floor, 1 near grumpy boy, 5 loads washing, 4 loads tumble dried, 6pm day boat, 1 model arrived in Bristol, 1 red pepper, 1 bow ready.
An early start, well for Mick he had a hire car to pick up in Hemel before we could check in at Cowroast Marina. As before the car hire fees were considerably more than for a small van, so that’s what we’d booked. Mick as he entered the office said that we didn’t need it to be a van, a car would be fine. So we got a Black Corsa which was far more comfortable for the same price.
A tight squeeze
Once back at the boat we pushed off and trundled our way to the top of the lock where a single hander was pleased to see us, until we turned into the marina. We’d been allocated a space opposite the entrance which was only just visible, they like to pack them in tightly round here! An awkward place to get into, but with skill, the odd touch to the girlie button and me fending off at the front too we pulled in without touch any other boat.
Mick checked to see how much credit had been left on the electric hook up, £11, we might end up staying the full three nights (minimum stay here) to use it all. Up at the office we were given a fob for the gate and shown round the facilities. Where once there had been a chandlery there is now a lounge with a pool table, book exchange etc.
You are not going anywhere without me!
We decided to put a load of washing on as soon as we’d hooked up. A 60 degree wash for the towels. This was a mistake as it took an extra hour to normal even on a quick wash. There were places to go and things to do!
Eventually we put the cooled ice block (no freezer still) in Tilly’s magic food bowl and opened up her toy box so that she could keep herself occupied whilst we were away. At 12:15 we pulled out of the marina gates and headed northwards to Scarborough.
The tenants in our house have just moved out, we like to visit at such times to check round. It also gives us the opportunity to rootle through our possessions that we left five years ago and pull out things we’d like or need. It was a long grey dreary drive up the country, slightly annoying as our tenant hadn’t informed us of when he was actually vacating the house and it turns out we could have done this trip from Leighton Buzzard instead last week. Oh well!
Now where did I put that?
We’d had an email from the agents who look after the house, informing us of various things that needed doing. We took a couple of hours to look ourselves making a list as we went. Some things will be paid for out of our tenants bond, other things are just general maintenance that need doing. As we haven’t been to the house in at least a couple of years it was nice to be home home, even if other people live there.
A quick look round the top floor where our land possessions live and a good chat with Andy our next door neighbour, we also got to meet Teddy who is our newest neighbour, aged two. Then we were hot footing it across town to reach Capplemans Chippy before they closed.
Vegan and Gluten free available
Capplemans, just off Prospect Road has gluten free and vegan options on their menu. I was eager to try out their haddock. With four boxes of each and one portion of mushy peas steaming in the car we then hot footed it across town to South Cliff where our friends Jaye and Duncan were waiting ready with plates in the oven.
Duncan, Jaye and Mick
We had a lovely evening catching up with all the news whilst defending my haddock from Pebbles before we retired to bed.
and Pebbles eyeing up my haddock
The local seagulls were elsewhere annoying another part of town so we both slept well. Both Jaye and Duncan were at work today which gave us the impetus to get going. Thank you very much for the bed and hopefully see you both soon.
Mixed media
My model was popped in the post, tracked guaranteed delivery by midday tomorrow as soon as the Post Office opened then we crossed the road to Tower Estates, the people who look after our house. A cuppa with Mark and Val was enjoyed as we worked through and compared notes. We’d been pleasantly surprised at how clean the house had been, just a shame the youngest tenant had chosen to do their own decorating in the wallpapered rooms, not the white emulsioned ones.
Everything that I needed
Back at the house I had a rootle through my work boxes. A roller tray, wallpaper brush, paste, scissors, spare wallpaper and some paste ready to mix. I had everything needed to patch up and cover the mixed media creations. Mick ticked a couple of things off the list too, replacing bulbs etc.
Then the hunt through our possessions started. When we’d started packing away our land life we’d been organised and labeled boxes. As time went on things got less so, in the end things just got mounded up on the top floor. I found my paint colour charts within seconds as I’d been sensible an just popped them on a shelf. But family archive things that we both wanted, well just where were they? Mick thought he’d put it in that corner, no. Maybe in the cupboard under the sink, no. Maybe in the roof space. I was looking for my Dad’s old kitbag, it was nowhere to be seen in the rooms.
The roof space it had to be. This was when we’d been organised thankfully. But making space to be able to get at the things we wanted was a bit hard. The bedding came out, then the kitbag, then the boxes Mick wanted. Hooray! We selected what we wanted along with allowing ourselves a little look at things. Then time was ticking there were still curtains to hang and lamp shades to go back up.
Jobs take time and become frustrating when they are not simple. One curtain track didn’t have enough runners on it, this of course was a much bigger track than any others in the house, which all had far too many runners on them! Time had run out along with patience there was no time to go on a hunt in the shops, this would have to be left for someone else to do.
We packed up the car, locked the door and said goodbye to our house again. The next time we visit will be when the next lot of tenants move on to pastures new.
A very late lunch at Morrisons along with a few supplies and we were on our way again, in constant rain back down the country. As I undid the cratch cover two white paws nudged the front curtain out of the way, Tilly was checking to see if it was us.
It’s all gone!
Well it was about bloomin time! My biscuits had run out, then the magic food bowl ran out, twice! I had all but eight tiny biscuits left and I’d been saving them just incase! They brought some interesting smelling boxes onto the boat. They say some of the things in there are over one hunderd years old. Glad they weren’t away for all that time, those meager biscuits wouldn’t have lasted. They didn’t buy me fish and chips like they did Pebbles, PAH!
I’d saved these but only just incase
0 locks, 0.16 miles, 1 left, 1 tight squeeze, 2 eagles, 1 car not van, 1 fob, £11 electric, A 4146, 450 ish miles by road, 19 enter the roundabouts, 38 rows knitted, 0 traffic cones, 4 of each, 1 mushy peas, 1 very good gf fish, 1 seaside cat, 1 lovely evening, 9 mentions of Duncan so far this year (now 10!), 2 parcels posted, 5 patches of paper, 2 colour charts, 2 boxes, 1 folder, 1 lot of letters, 5½d for Mackintosh Rolos, 2 sketch books (1 my grandfathers), 1 cat brought to the front at Tibshelf, 1 very hungry cat, 1 press night missed.
Ted, my god son, with his brand new first cousin once removed
With thundery rain forecast we decided to stay put in Leighton Buzzard today. We woke to the news that my best friend, Emma in Australia had become a Great Aunt overnight. Photos of Nellie and Steve with their new baby girl were flying through the air from hemisphere to hemisphere, all are doing well, no mention of a name as yet.
A good shop front high up, might be useful for Panto
What to do on a wet day in Leighton Buzzard? Mick wanted to get some new waterproofs so we went into town to see what we could find. A branch of Millets came up trumps with a new bright blue (lined in red) coat and some considerably more sober black over trousers. I’ll make sure I warn you before I post a photograph as the coat is very bright! Sadly they didn’t have a new coat for me, I don’t do pink and pockets closed with buttons don’t make sense to me. A more practical coat is required.
Next we walked up to find Lake Street.
Yesterday Mick had decided to see if he could find out where his Grandfather had been born. His family are pretty good with family history and he knew that Phillip had been born in Leighton Buzzard, but where exactly? Last night he’d signed up to ancestry.co.uk and got hold of a copy of the 1871 census which listed his Great Grandfather William Henry Chignell a year before Phillip was born.
1871 census
The family is listed as living on Lake Street. No house number is shown, just a schedule number. Half of Lake Street has been redeveloped over the years, so it may be that the actual building no longer stands, but it was worth a try. Lake Street is also where the library is, so we went in to see if they could help.
Knitted ladies
Blue Tit
The two ladies sat at the desk did their best to be helpful. House numbers should have been listed by that time, but no more information was found. Mick was signed up with a library card so that he could use the library’s Ancestry account for free. Here he searched through all sorts of records sadly to no avail. I on the other hand wandered around looking at a knitted display and reminiscing of my days when I worked as a book seller.
Phillip was born somewhere on this street
A couple of suggestions have been made to try looking at Family Search and to ask at the library to see if they have any Victorian trade/people directories that his father may be listed in. Thank you Kath and Kay. William and his family moved around quite a lot, in the census he is listed as being a professor of music, an organist, elsewhere he is listed as a travelling salesman. A birth certificate for Phillip might give us more, but as we’re just passing through more local detailed searching may have to wait until next time we’re in Leighton Buzzard.
The library
Dark clouds accompanied us back to the boat, maybe the really bad weather was about to hit. Tilly complained that she wasn’t allowed out. Jewsons has easy canal towpath access for cats and they constantly seem to be using forklifts, so Tilly had to wait until they closed for the day, but this still gave her a few hours of exploration.
Late afternoon we received our second lot of baby news for the day. Ruth, Mick’s niece has had a baby girl, Penelope, a couple of days ago. All are doing well and Anne, Micks sister is on hand for Granny duties. So the next generation are increasing in number, wonder how they will trace us all in the future, all on line I suspect.
As we waited for the deluge to arrive I packed up my socks ready to be dispatched tomorrow. They have turned out rather well I think, I’m glad as they have taken a lot of patience firstly in finding the yarn, then getting it and thirdly knitting it up. I’ve actually knitted three socks to get two. Out of interest the other day I looked to see if there was any tracking information about the two orders that didn’t arrive. The second parcel arrived in Rode Heath 10 days after I got a refund! Glad we didn’t wait for it to arrive unlike today’s almost none existent rain.
Mismatched pair
0 locks, 0 miles, 2 short showers, 0 deligue, 0 house number, 1 library card, 1 new set of waterproofs, 1 security tag, 1 square headed bit in a set for £31! 21 days for 24hr delivery, 2 new babies!
