Anyway, yesterday (Friday, I think) saw us put in our biggest effort yet and a mammoth 15 miles that saw us move on from Maidenhead and on to Henley-Upon-Thames. As usual we came a cropper and had a few unexpected jems thown in.
After a pleasent evening the night before in the Thames Hotel bar, we retreated back to mooring position and settled down for the night. However a couple of unexpected visitors assured that our night in Maidenhead wasn't the quietest we've had. Firstly a number of the local youths obviously use the little park we'd set up camp in as their nightly hang-out. But thankfully, soon after their arrival, the rain began and we lost their company. Our second visitor was a party boat that crawled through Maidenhead at 2am. A jolly good time was being had by all 6 onboard guests, but I can't say we enjoyed Lional Ritchie at that time in the morning.
After a disturbed night we left a little late the following morning, with one of us (guess who?) being the last to be ready. Due to the late start we decided to for-go breakfast and push on with Dave and Keith taking the first stint. A bit like the day before though the wind was against us to start with and despite passing through Boulters Lock quickly our progress soon stalled. the ride though was very pleasent and we soon passed the Trust property of Cliveden. http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-vh/w-visits/w-findaplace/w-cliveden.htm We did manage to get Cookham though for mid-morning and decided to stop off for brunch.It's funny how sometimes random people or places seem to crop up a couple of times in quick secsession. Only last week me and Dave had popped along to the Nationl Trust property Sandham Memorial Chapel in Burghclere, Hampshire; http://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/main/w-sandhammemorialchapel and saw the work of Stanley Spencer;& little more then a week later we find ourselves in the town that Spencer was not only born but is also buried. I'd like to say this was deliberate and a brilliant bit of planning on my part, but actually I didn't realise this until we actually saw the headstone in the graveyard while passing through. Anyway it was a nice suprise.
Cookham, was much the same as Bray the previous day, an unexpected jem with a nice row of shops and pictraesque qualities. We found a lovely little cafe and had THE BEST bacon roll this side of London. It's funny how you getting very excited about the smallest matters!!
Anyway, we pushed on from Cookham and the water got worse. The row up to Marlow has to be the most difficult we've come across. Even with myself steering we managed to get into a bit of a tangle at Bourne End and collide with a whole sailing club!! But hard work got us through and we managed with difficulty to get to Marlow for lunch.
Lunch went down a treat but even Keith's Robinson fruit drink couldn't preper ourselves for the traffic jam we came to on returning to our skiff. We found out that we were travelling to Henley at the same time as half of The Thames. It turns out that this weekend is the Classic Boat Regatta this weekend at Henley, and so a remarkable collection of boats were heading west for the event. A collection of slippers, steam launches and early motor boats were jossling for position into Marlow lock. We managed to slip into a small gap, but the hold-up did slow us for the day. However, the banter and the conversation with some of these boaters was definately a highlight for the day.
Of all the boats that passed us during the day though, the celebrity boat of the day was definately the number of Dunkirk Little Ships that were both in France in 1940 and also the recent celebration events. Another treat for the day was a promise of meeting Rodney Bewes later in the day as he was both in Henley but was also a great 3 Men In A Boat fan. We had become minor celebrities ouselves over the last few days with us often being photographed and cheered on by both those on the banks of the river and our fellow boaters. Keith's highlight of the day was being cheered on soon after Marlow by a group of school girls who also gave us a renditon of "Row, Row, Row, Your Boat."
The wind was difficult after lunch as well, but a few races with passing boats did push us on. We got to Henley though quite late though and even the enjoyment of rowing the course wasn't enough to give us any more euphemism to continue beyond Henley lock. With the classic regatta in full flow we sneaked into a place labeled skiffs and rowing boats and a few of our friends from the day ensured us we should be fine to moore up and partake.However, we later found out that the cost to partake is £90 and so we decided to move on at first thing in the morning and sneak away before we were registered.
With the light fading we met up with Keith's girlfriend Rose, and split up for a night in Henley's famous public houses. As we had nailed 15 miles today, especially against a hevay head wind for much of the day, we felt we had to celebrate. Unfortunatly we only had a hour and a half before closing time, so we had to be quick. Lets just say 8 pubs later and me and Dave staggered back along the river bank with a take away pizza. Its prob not suprising that we didn't get to meet Mr Bewes!
Hasten to say we awoke with a head, but this was only the start of our worries.
Gary
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