Tim and Ann Raven on board AC for lunch


Blue tack going past theHouses of Parliament


Clive and Donna, friends from Auckland
on board AC.


Mary and Peter on board Blue Tack


Mary, Peter and Lois outside the
Tide End Cottage, Teddington


Overnight mooring at Teddington


Peter and Mary having lunch at a riverside pub, The Swan


Seally, Terry and Lois at a restaurant in Calais



Terry and Sealley getting AC ready to depart St Katharine's 7 June

LIMEHOUSE MARINA – LONDON JUNE 2007

On Thursday the 7th of June we took the lines, cobwebs and all, off Alpha Crucis and moved her out of St Katharine’s Dock a mile down the Thames to Limehouse Marina, our new home for the next month before we head off from London. Needless to say it was quite a nostalgic moment for both of us (mostly for me) to be finally leaving our ‘nesting place’ for the last 7 months – can’t believe where all that time has gone!!!!
Gosh what a wonderful experience we have had being in such a haven for all that time, it will live long in our memories for years to come. We are so so glad we decided to ‘winter over’ in London.

Anyway clearly I certainly had a ‘comfy blanket’ around me too long when I felt quite sad doing ‘one last shop at Waitrose (supermarket) in St Katharine’s’ - how bad is that! I clearly needed to ‘toughen up’ and move on!! You will be interested to know when we left St Katharine’s, our lovely ‘Alpha Crucis’ obliged with the engine and the genset starting first pop after seven months!!!!

So what have we been up to in the last month or so since we returned from our very long visit to NZ?? Predominately we have been spending time catching up with friends, including some that have flown in from NZ. However Terry has been busy, in between our social activity, with installing our new water maker! Subsequent to this our ice maker has failed (drastic) as has our DVD player – the buying has been completed, the installation is to come!

A couple of weeks back we were fortunate to be taken on a journey up the River Thames to Staines by Peter and Mary Reeve on their motor boat ‘Blue Tack’ for the weekend. We travelled to Teddington on the first day, which is the first of the many locks on the Thames, where we stayed overnight. For dinner we wandered across the river and up the road to a renowned pub for dinner – the Tide End Cottage. The next day we continued our journey to Staines – pass the famous Hampton Court – and tied up to the Swan Pub pontoon and toddled ashore – hop, skip and not a jump to the restaurant for a fabulous lunch. A great way to experience this part of England and we were grateful to do this on their lovely motor boat as opposed to a narrow boat! Peter and Mary drove us back to St Katharine’s in a van they had positioned on the previous day.

We have caught up with a young couple (daughter of friend from Christchurch) Nicky Burmester and her husband Chris, who live in Canary Wharf not far from Limehouse. I have heard a lot about the lovely Nicky from her father, Phil, over the years, who we managed to catch with in Christchurch recently.
Anyway since we have been back from NZ we have both been to dinner at each other’s home’s and had a great time. Nicky and Chris have an apartment on the Thames – a great spot and in fact when we were there for dinner we sat out on their balcony – first time we had alfresco dinner in London this visit! During the evening we were very surprised to learn that they used hula hoops as a form of exercise! That was like a ‘bolt from the pass’ - for those who can remember! They had them specially made, in their favourite colours – I might add! I was game to give it a go (last time about 30yrs ago) and managed to keep the damn thing up around my middle for a few minutes – I think the wine helped! Nicky is going to arrange for us to get one each so maybe we can keep those pounds off by frolicking abut with these hula hoops!!

Nicky made us welcome in our new home base at Limehouse (they are only about a 15 minute walk along the Thames) by familiarising us with the Canary Wharf complex. .It is made up of about five precincts – with shops, supermarkets all underground. It is a major financial district where 100,000 people work!

We have had a couple of lots of visitors from NZ. Clive, Donna along with Clive’s daughters Sheena and Christina came for drinks carrying an array of fine canapés, cheeses and wine from Harrods! The price of these would have been equal to our food costs for a week! Delicious! And we had Maurice and Gill Atcheson from Auckland staying with us for 5 days which was fun! They have gone off to do their canal stint up North with a couple of friends from Canada whom we had on our yacht for dinner one evening. That same week we had three other lots of friends for lunch on three separate days and another two lots of people for drinks on another two separate occasions – all in all a very hectic social 10 days.

In addition to all of that in the same week, our lovely friend Seally took us to Calais, France, to top up our wine supplies. In fact they were so low that in for the first time in 5 years since we bought Alpha Crucis in Sydney in 2002, we finally got to the bottom of both the red and white wine lockers – a very uncomfortable feeling we might add!! Anyway after that very pleasant day outing which included a nice lunch at a typical French Bistrot – of course – our stocks are now back up to an acceptable and comforting level!!!

Three days before we left St Katharine’s we had our dear friends Tim and Ann Raven for lunch, who we have stayed with a couple of times in Shiplake (near Henley-on-Thames). Ann has not been very well over recent years and was determined to see our lovely AC and indeed she did. We had a great day with them on the boat in St Katharine’s and at the end of that it was concluded that as we will be still in London during the Henley Regatta – Tim has arranged tickets for us all on the 5th of July – what a treat that will be. Just two days after we arrive back from our week’s cruise of the Baltic.

Yes we are off on our cruise of the Baltic on the Silversea vessel Silver Shadow on the 25th of June from Stockholm. It is only 7 days but will be fantastic to see this part of globe especially on this luxurious ship. We travel to Estonia, St Petersburg (Terry and I were there for Xmas in ’98 but will good to see it in summer) Helsinki and disembark in Copenhagen. This was instigated by our friends Carol Ann and Thomas from Atlanta, Georgia, when they spent time with us in Savannah Georgia last June. We also have our friends Alistair & Charlotte Sutherland from Auckland and our London friends Faye and John joining us. A good time should be had by all!!

Speaking of Faye and John – we were their guests – along with 28 others at a hotel in Reading this past weekend – the Forbury, for Faye’s 50th and their 25th wedding anniversary! What a weekend!! The hotel itself was stunning, as was the dinner and the entertainment on Saturday night. It was such fun meeting some of their friends and spending time with the one’s we have met before. A very memorable celebration for them as well as for us!

Ok, enough reporting on our social life ….. Our plans, which have changed, are now to leave London on around the 10th of July. We still intend to have AC lifted out at Wallasea (start of the Thames) and instead of heading to Scotland we are now planning to go to France, Portugal, Spain and then onto Italy – to be on the Amalfi Coast by mid September. Several reasons; we have two of my sisters travelling to Europe for the first time that will be in the vicinity, followed closely by Nicole and David and grandchildren who are joining us on AC for 10 days or so at the beginning of October. Plus we have another friend from Australia – Maurie Hill also joining us about the same time. Therefore we didn’t have sufficient time (as our Baltic cruise is a week later than originally scheduled) to travel up to Scotland including the New Hebrides and get to Italy by September, therefore unfortunately, much to Terry’s horror, we had to forego Scotland for another time!

It is our intention at this point that we will eventually end up in Turkey to winter over – but once again that could change but we do plan to be somewhere warmer this coming winter.

Isn’t it fabulous we have won the LV Cup in Valencia!! What a fantastic final last race! We managed to see on the big screen at a pub but unfortunately without the volume – very difficult to get the English excited about sailing and especially – football and rugby very much prevail!! Anyway it was great to see the race even without the volume. What a result – roll on the Kiwi’s and let’s bring the damn Cup home again!!!!

Ken and Akiko Everett from Sydney have been in London for the past few days visiting from their Villa in Italy. They joined us for dinner on AC and yesterday I joined Akiko and her friend Beth to visit Farnham and Guilford, a pleasant day in the hinterland. Ken and Akiko are planning to join AC when or after we reach the Amalfi Coast.

Well that fairly much brings us up to date at this point.

Love

The Jolly Rogers