UK « Aboard Dignity (Lagoon 420) Blog

First Contact

by steve, on December 23rd, 2011 (UK)

Wednesday was focused on catching up on affairs here in the Uk. Without going into too much detail the day involved visiting the Citizen’s Advice Bureau, signing on a new property manager and writing a nasty letter. We feel better as a bad situation is now on a positive trajectory although how much we can recover from the bad position we’ve been in remains unclear. At least now we shouldn’t get any worse off.

Yesterday was a whole lot more fun. We took the train into London first meeting our old friend Dick who we last saw last Xmas in New Zealand. The good thing about having a blog is not having to talk about everything we’ve done for the last year so we had a great time talking about everything and generally fixing the world. After a long brunch with Dick we then headed off to visit son John who we last saw in Tahiti in 2010. He’s living in our old stomping grounds in North London and it was interesting to see how much some things had changed and some things not in the twenty odd years since we lived in that area. We paid a brief visit to Wood Green which is hardly recognizable. At least all the roads were where we left them.

In the evening John’s partner Ella arrived from work meeting us in a local pub. This was our first glimpse of the mound surrounding our soon to be born grandchild. Quite a moment.

We ate a takeaway together at their flat catching up on everything before heading back to Helen’s sister’s home in Chesham. We had one bit of bad luck on the return journey when the train that would have taken us to Chesham closed it’s doors as we were running down the steps to try and catch it. This left us half an hour to kill which we did wondering around the Baker Street area failing, as ever, to find 221b which of course doesn’t exist.

Excess Latitude

by steve, on December 21st, 2011 (Saudi Arabia, South Pacific, UK)

Our brief stay at the Impangele B&B was a real pleasure. Our host Walter looked after us well cooking a great dinner in the evening accompanied by great wine from a fine selection. We spent the evening chatting and shared a second bottle finally polishing off some port on the house. In the morning he cooked up a delicious breakfast before a couple of the dogs took Helen and I for a walk around the lake/bird sanctuary outside.

For anyone visiting Johannesburg or, like us, simply passing through we thoroughly recommend the place.

Our trip to the airport was mildly eventful as my GPS had no knowledge of the blocked roads that had turned that residential area into a large compound with just a few ways in and out. Neither did my GPS know about some road alterations on the freeway which resulted in us being unable to get off when we wanted. We had plenty of time in hand and we made it to the airport in very good time.

Keeping our costs down we flew with Saudi Arabia Airways via (a 5 hour stop in) Jeddah which was another cultural experience for us. Helen very quickly felt under dressed amongst the majority of women on the plane who all seemed to have nice eyes. She rectified this by putting on her leggings planned for later when we arrived in the Uk.

The flights were both around 6 hours each give or take so it wasn’t too bad. No alcohol of course on the plane nor in Jeddah airport which wasn’t much to speak of and, quite surprisingly, cold from excessive use of air conditioning. We both managed a couple of hours sleep on the second flight.

Helen’s sister met us at the airport and took us to her home in Chesham. That was a welcome relief for us as we were quite tired and not adjusting well to the cold. We weren’t overly busy during the day but we did make and have an appointment with Barclays Bank here to open an account. We’re fed up of excessive fees on our overseas withdrawals and Barclays here in the Uk (as Bank of America in the US) are part of the Global ATM Alliance. By using a Barclays ATM card we’ll have lower fees in the countries we’ll be visiting next year. That would be nice. Interestingly Bank of America has a few more restrictions over the countries we’ll be visiting so the Uk banks is better for us. Quite coincidentally, in the news in the Uk that morning was notice that some banks, including Barclays, will be lowering their overseas transaction costs. No details of this had flowed down to the branches yet but it can only be good news for us.

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In the evening we had a take away curry from our favourite restaurant here in Chesham, our old home town. Very delicious. We’d been looking forward to this and weren’t disappointed. I also had to get involved in some calls to New Zealand as the parts of our sex-change for the boat are ready to be shipped and it looks like things were left until the very last minute to work out logistics. I hope we have no delays as a result of this.

This morning we’re up and about later than normal but it’s pitch black outside. It’s winter of course but we’re also in latitudes not experienced for a long time, particularly this time of year. It feels quite weird. Not sure I like this winter lark but I’m sure we’ll get used to it.

Arrived in Uk

by steve, on December 20th, 2011 (UK)

Flights were on time and we had no problems bar getting little sleep. Full update later.

Last Day in Blighty

by steve, on October 1st, 2009 (Grenada, UK)

Our last day in Blighty was a long and pleasant one. We didn’t get up until after 9am but were out of the boat before 10. We again walked over the river to the station and headed off to Baker Street. I had located an astronomy store which sold specs for looking at the sun. As we’re hoping to catch the solar eclipse next year, these will be use additions to our inventory.

Next it was off to Oxford Circus to meet Helen’s old (meaning past) traveling friend, Gel, and her daughter Hayley for lunch. We had a pub lunch at the Slug & Lettuce off Regents Street and washed it down with wine and beer.

After Lunch Hayley had to go back to work but Gel stayed with us for an hour or two to carry on the catch up. We sat around admiring the drunks and avoiding (successfully in Gel’s and my case) the pigeon poo in Soho square.

Eventually we had to part ways and say our goodbyes. Helen and I took a long walk to the City passing a lot of our old haunts including the place where we both met at work. We met an old friend of mine, Mark, in Bishopsgate and soon we were back to old times which meant knocking back several beers. Again – it was great to catch up with old friends but eventually we had to again part ways.

Helen and I returned to the boat to pack our bags. Dick was due back shortly after 10pm from his trip to Brussels. He duly arrived on time and as we had not had much time together we went out for a meal (with wine).

We eventually crashed for a short sleep before waking at 5am to head back to Grenada. Dick dropped us off at Clapham Junction railway station and from there we took the train to Gatwick.

Bar some unexpected restrictions on hand luggage weigh the journey was uneventful. Jackie and Mike were there to collect us from the airport. We had made it through customs without a hitch which was fortunate as we had a landrover radiator and parts for their lawnmower, all of which could have triggered undue interest and import taxes.

Mike had to head off in a different direction so Jackie took us back to the boat via a supermarket for some provisions. Back on the boat we had mixed news. There was no evidence of any unexpected entry so the recent c/c issue remains a mystery. All the electrics were fine and the vast bank of batteries nicely topped up with the solar. The fridge came straight on. The boatyard only appears to have done the bottom paint and not some of the other work scheduled. We also discovered that ants have found their way in. It was too late to talk to the yard management about the work as they all close up at 4 it seems so that will have to wait until tomorrow.

For now it’s a bit of unpacking, showering and mainly rest. Tomorrow we get busy getting Dignity ready to go back in the water. Jim from Bees Knees will pop over and bring some of his ant killer. I’ll also seek his oppinion on the work the boatyard hasn’t addressed. We may just leave this until New Zealand. It’s far too hot and we want to get back in the water.

Aboard Jacana

by steve, on September 30th, 2009 (UK)

On Monday night we had our final Indian take-away from Chesham Tandoori – probably the last we’ll have for several years. (Nephew) David, his wife Tara and daughter Lola came over for final goodbyes.

On Tuesday morning we lugged our heavy bags to the station and rode four separate London Underground trains to Parsons Green where had another long walk with our bags to meet Dick, our old friend and Sam’s Godfather. He soon took us to his barge, Jacana, where he stays when in London. We had been expecting a narrow, cramped canal barge. What we were brought to was a 100 year old converted river barge, about 150 feet long and about 20 feet wide. Inside it is cavernous including one room with a baby grand piano. Being berthed on the Thames, it spends half the time afloat and half the time sitting on the mud.

Once settled we all went for lunch at a nearby pub with all of us choosing bangers and mash to eat.

After lunch Dick had to leave to go to Brussels for a conference. We spent a short while settling in on the boat before heading off. To get back on the underground we had a pleasant walk through Wandsworth Park and over the Putney rail and footbridge. We caught a couple of trains to Tottenham Court Road station.

We first checked out the locations of the Dominion Theatre and the Creation restaurant where we were to later have our dinner and show. Then we entered the British Museum where we spent the next few hours perusing the exhibits. We first went to the European section. I particular wanted to see the ancient clocks and watches section but this section turned out to be closed for a couple of weeks. Nevertheless there were plenty of interesting exhibits to see. Next came the ancient Persian section then ancient Egypt. We concluded our tour with the Asian sections.

Having worn our feet out we decided to stop for a cup of coffee. We found a pleasant street café nearby to recharge. We still had time left over so we went wondering and ended up in a pub near Covent Garden for a pint/glass of wine.

Soon it was time for dinner. Because of our ticket/dinner deal we weren’t presented with the full menu but we were still able to choose two course meals that were quite tasty. From the restaurant we went back to the theatre to pick up our tickets. Rather than sit around for half an hour we had another walk around the area before settling into our seats a few minutes before the show started.

We had little idea about the story for “We Will Rock You”. It turns out to be set in the future when the music corporations have banned any form of live music and it’s up to one ‘dreamer’ to rediscover rock music. Sounds cheesy but it was excellent. All the music was by Queen. As we are familiar with all the songs, as was much of the audience, it was quite involving.

By the time we made our way back to the boat it was almost midnight. It didn’t take long before we were out for the count.

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