Parvis Wharf (River Wey) – Wednesday 9th July

I slept for 9 solid hours last night – that doesn’t happen very often!

We spent the morning either waiting for phone calls or making them.  Between Dot and us the phone waves must have been buzzing.  Dot was the first to get the call to say that they were going round the corner onto the Wey and to TLC at Parvis Wharf where Ewn ha Cul would have her back end lifted out of the water to inspect the prop.  Just after they left we got the call to say that we were to go too so we set off for the half miles trip.  We arrived and almost immediately Gordon got the nod to take his boat under the bridge to the crane.  TLC is run by Stuart and Julia and they were absolute stars as they had had to move four boats and stop working on other boats to sort us out.  As Ewn ha Cul came out of the water we could see the damage to the prop – it’s a wonder that Gordon had managed to get down six locks on Tuesday!  The engineer, Colin, took the prop off, the boat was lowered back into the water and then poled back under the bridge to where we were moored. 

That doesn't look too good

Colin taking the prop off

That doesn't look too good!

Ewn ha Cul being poled back to her mooring

Next it was Mary H’s turn.  We knew our prop wasn’t as badly damaged as Gordon’s but it really needed to be checked after such a thump – we couldn’t risk it falling off as we went down the Thames!  Richard steered her into the slings and slowly she had the indignity of having her bottom raised out of the water for all to see!!  We could see immediately that there was no damage and Richard and I heaved a big sigh of relief.  Colin got into the water and checked that everything was OK and nothing was out of place or not true.  All was good :-)

Are my flowers safe?

Where did that plastic bag come from?

Colin getting wet again!

The indignity of having one's bottom in the air

Mary H was lowered back into the water and we returned to our mooring.  We are moored just down from the Byfleet Boating Club on their moorings which are great and we aren’t upsetting anyone.  (Stuart did check with them first that this was OK!)

In the evening we were supposed to have been meeting up with old friends in Woking but, of course, that all had to be changed.  Steve and Linda came to the boat and then we walked into Byfleet to go to The Plough for a meal with Dot and Gordon.  We had a great evening with lots of chat but sadly we felt that the food wasn’t really up to much though Richard said the Doombar was excellent!

It was a nice ending to a stressful day made worse by some very sad news from home.

0.76 miles

0 locks