An exciting prospect! (real-time)

Jess had to get to Bedford yesterday evening for a Said the Maiden rehearsal. (They're appearing at the Costa del Folk later in the month, a huge, international festival of folk music held annually, this year in Portugal.

Last year's festival in Mallorca

After that, they embark on a 21-gig UK tour to promote their latest album. Planning and rehearsal are high on their agenda!)

Jess was tired after a day's work, so we drove her to Hannah's flat for the rehearsal, and then went to the nearby Embankment Hotel for dinner (a lovely place with excellent service and excellent food - apart from the Banoffee Sundae which had far too much offee and far too little ban!) As the name suggests, the restaurant is on the embankment of a river - the Great Ouse - so after we'd eaten we went for an amble alongside the river for an hour or so.

It was beautiful. Trees and bridges were tastefully illuminated under a warm night sky, the moon peering through dramatic Gothic clouds from time to time. Autumn leaves covered the walkways. The broad river hosted myriad swans and geese, and not a few ducks.

Then we came to an information board that reminded us of the decades-long project to connect the Ouse at Bedford with a 20-mile canal from Milton Keynes. The project is still alive and well, and the board presented us with the whole vision and the story so far.

(photos courtesy of geograph.org.uk)

We stood on the suspension bridge, and looked up and down the river, thinking about this project, realizing what a fantastic thing it would be to connect the River Great Ouse and the Grand Union Canal. The interest it would draw from boaters and gongoozlers alike - and from local businesses, too. And as we considered the river and its embankments, the parkland that's there now and the water-parks planned for the connecting route, we saw an excellent opportunity for the IWA to host there one of their annual Festivals of Water such as we attended at Pelsall last year. It would be the perfect venue, and I'm certain the people of Bedford would love it, too.

The canal link will certainly open up new travel opportunities to boaters. The current journey for us from Yelvertoft to Bedford would be 184 miles with 88 locks - about two weeks of relaxed boating. The new route would shorten that to around 60 miles and 22 locks in about five or six days. It isn't all about time, though. As the map shows, the link makes it possible to cut out the River Nene and a large chunk of the Ouse, with their dozens of (some say difficult) locks - not everyone's ideal cruising. And once on the Ouse at Bedford, a journey to Cambridge or Ely is a relatively easy possibility. We'd love that!

So all power to the Bedford & Milton Keynes Trust in their endeavours, and the greatest of respect for their vision and determination. This is indeed an exciting prospect!

(photo B&MK Trust)

(The Maidens had a really good rehearsal!)

Repost/update - "Snow good"!

I had to withdraw this post just a matter of hours after posting it. I realised - in the middle of the night, of course. When else would it be? - that it contains a video, and information about a bigger video, that my big (well, older) sister wasn't to know about until the following Thursday. She reads the blog from time to time, and I would have spoiled a surprise for her. The whole video, explained below, is over 30 minutes long, and a great piece of work by nephew Dan.

So, the post that follows is actually dated 11th February. Read on...

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On a much happier note than that of my last post (bring out the bugle!), my sister, Jill, celebrated her 70th birthday on Friday, and Grace and I went to join a group of 25 family and friends to honour the occasion in a restaurant near their home. There were great-nephews-and-nieces there whom we hadn't seen since they were toddlers, and one great-niece we'd never even met, so there was a lot of catching up to do. It was a lovely occasion. Jill had been kept in the dark about the event, and had a great surprise when husband Rod brought her into the restaurant. It was a buffet-style Chinese establishment, and the food was really very good.

Jill's youngest son, Dan, had asked lots of Jill's friends and family to make birthday greetings videos, out of which he's going to make a compilation. This was the Distill contribution - including out-takes! It was made at night, in inadequate lighting, so it's rather grainy, so don't watch full-screen! Click HERE to watch.

It was snowing quite heavily as we drove south on the M1 on Friday evening, but stopped very abruptly at Northampton. We were a bit concerned that the trip back to Kantara would involve snow-drifts, and it was even snowing in Bedford when we left the restaurant - we'd been told by the Bedfordians at the "do" that it never snows in Bedford. But all was fine, and the boat was only chilly when we got back, not thick with the white stuff.

The thing is, though, that we'd really love it to snow. Proper snow, inches deep. We think back to March 2013, when we were out on the canal in some very heavy snow, and it was wonderful.

This weekend's been cold and damp. Any attempt at snow has been thwarted by wet ground that won't let it settle. So it's grey, windy, bitingly cold. But that's outside, and we don't have to go outside. It's very comfortable right where we are!