Early October weekend with settled weather!

At this stage in the season, moments have to be seized: carpe diem and all that...  Saturday and Sunday presented themselves with an established area of high pressure sitting over the UK and the promise of a break in recent settled conditions early next week.  The usual musical commitments not keeping me at home on Sunday morning, I was free to sail on both days, albeit that I needed to come home in between.  

On Saturday, I had company in the form of mother.  In the summer, I like to join her on a river cruise in her Viking 23 cruise Alouette.  Over the years, we've covered many hundreds of miles of the Inland Waterways from the Thames and its tributaries, the Avon and Severn, the Broads and a large number of canals from the Kennett and Avon in the south, to the Stratford canal and then canals up through Birmingham and into Staffordshire, as well as the network in Shropshire and off into Wales.  So, this return trip is an opportunity for mother to join me for a short trip on Daisy II and we've done this every year, albeit in the cold of October.

Of course, Saturday was far from cold although we had to make the most of the little wind there was.

Here's a short video clip taken with the GoPro.

4.5nm

On Sunday, I returned alone and had a longer trip along to Shotley and back along to Woolverstone. 

As usual, seals were very much in evidence, although I didn't expect to see one sitting on the stern of a rowing boat!

let's see what we can sea lion around...

The reason for this snap was purely nostalgic.  In the 1970s, my late stepfather used to own a Dell Quay Fisher Boat just like this one which was pottering around Pin Mill.  I'd not seen it before, and it brought back many happy memories of motoring out of Minehead harbour on the Bristol Channel.

The point of this picture is to highlight the propensity of birds, we think turnstones, to populate some craft at Pin Mill, though not others.  It is extraordinary how some boats are left untouched and others are taken over - there seems to be no 'rhyme or reason' why certain boats are targeted.  Here, they have clearly shown some good taste in choosing a Drascombe lugger although, as mooring owners at Pin Mill will testify, they are a proper damned nuisance.  A thread on the Drascombe forum asks for techniques to dissuade them from choosing a host boat.  I always use supermarket bags although, as from tomorrow they will cost 5p, the regular supply of these will undoubtedly cease.

10.7nm