Just keeping up

We certainly chose the right day to go out to Anglesey Abbey! Since then, we've had light rain, heavy rain, gusty wind, gale-force wind, Storm Caroline and the tail-end of Hurricane Epsilon. On the minority occasions when it's not doing that, it's beautiful.

But we've not been able to do a fraction of the work we'd wanted to do. I'd like to do another cleaning of the cratch cover; green algae is a pain. I'd like to pack the channel through which our stove chimney passes through the roof. Pack it with rock-wool, that is. And the paintwork would be better-off with a washing, waxing and polishing. It'd be better-off if we could finish the touching-up we started ages ago.

None of these jobs is essential, but it still irks us that we can't cross any of them off our ToDo list.

Jess is having a great time working at the Reykjavik Grapevine in Iceland. She's written 51 articles in the 7 weeks she's been there, travelled around a lot and really enjoyed the scenery. I'm not so sure she enjoyed the rather strong earthquake a few days back! She's just over half-way through her internship now, and she'll hate leaving.

NB Lyndsey Ann left the marina the same day that Jess flew to Iceland, and they arrived back yesterday. They had a good time, travelling when the weather let them and sitting out the rest. I can't deny I'm envious, but I still don't regret staying here in the marina. We weighed up the pros and cons of cruising, and the cons won.

Those wise readers who bought my "Hints and tips for life with your feet under water" , please note that there's a new post in the Addendum Blog - "Update to Chapter 1 – Hardware (bits and pieces)"

Those of you who haven't yet exchanged a mere £1.99 for the book, see what Towpath Talk had to say about it, and buy it here!

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Awesome Autumn

We were very much in need of time away from the boat - I'd never expected to say that. Last week, we consulted the weather forecast for this week, debated the accuracy of the forecast, which has been pretty poor lately, decided we'd take the chance, and booked to visit Anglesey Abbey in Cambridgeshire. Yesterday was the day.

We didn't go in the house. It wasn't open, but we've been in before anyway. This day, we just wanted the space, the fresh air and the autumnal beauty. And we got that in profusion.

The sun was out, the temperature mild, we picnicked in the garden, and autumn was awesome!