... and Millie makes three: Limehouse Basin (Regents Canal)

We were away by 9am as we were worried that C&RT were going to close the canal to search for Alice Gross – in fact the email came in notifying us of the closure at 9.41am. We went through Brentford Gauging Lock and the down to Thames Lock. We had a wait of just over an hour and were then locking down and out onto the Thames.

We had a very easy journey down – much calmer and quieter than the Sunday afternoon that we thought was quiet! The only bit of drama was coming into Limehouse Lock as the current took Mary H and we banged rather hard head on into the wall! We did, however, pass HippopoThames, a 68 foot wooden sculpture. It is a new art installation for the capital by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman.

We knew it was going to be busy in Limehouse as not only are there the St. Pancras Cruising Club (from now on referred to as SPCC!) cruise boats in here but also boats from the Stort Boat Cub (SBC). We are joining the SPCC tomorrow for a narrowboat cruise down the Bow River and out onto the Thames to see the TallShips. We then wend our way back up to Limehouse. The SBC members have chartered a Thames Sailing Barge to take 50 of them down to see the Tall Ships.

Limehouse Lock with it's pea soup

We had to breast up against another boat going on the cruise but I couldn’t get off the boat as the wall was too high. Fortunately Mimi and Richard, who we last saw at their home at Broxbourne in August), are here with the SBC and they arranged for us to breast up with some of their boats – we are 5 out but at least I can get off!

Mary H is in there somewhere

In the evening we had a safety briefing in the Cruising Association – guess who were late L My fault entirely! After the briefing we had supper and met some of our fellow intrepid explorers then back to Mary H to try and get a decent night’s sleep.

We left Muffin on the boat again while we were out. I had had a comment on the blog from Julia and Mark who suggested a Kong stuffed with treats and topped off with peanut butter – sorry you two but it didn’t work! Apparently he barked for the majority of the time we were out and the Kong was still on the floor untouched. Back to the drawing board.

As this is the second time we have done the trip this year I won’t bore you all the usual photos – instead I have tried to take some more interesting ones of buildings that don’t usually get photographed. I will let them tell the story.