We had a lovely evening last night, after we managed to get the access code for the gate again. Martyn decided to wash his shorts, forgetting that the piece of paper with the gate code on it was still in his his pocket. We found the soggy mess after spending 10 minutes searching the boat for it!! Anyway, we had a drink in the marina bar and one (maybe two) in the Creeksea Ferry Inn and reminisced about previous visits to Wallasea. We retired to the boat to open the bottle of champagne that Martyn had been given as a leaving present from work - it was very nice - and sat on the roof of the boat to watch the sun go down. We got talking to our neighbours who just happened to be the people who run the ferry and the seal watching trips. They live at Wallasea full time on their boat, which they are in the process of renovating and are an amazingly generous couple. We were offered a lift to Burnham for supplies, fresh crab, milk... they couldn't do enough for us. If I knew how to dress a crab I might have been tempted... They are the sort of couple who renew your faith in mankind. They live on the sea, catch their food from it, make a living from it and have a huge amount of respect for it. What more can you want? He also had a friend living on a narrow boat in Hebden Bridge, it really is a very small world!
As for today - the Captain made me get up at 6.30am - slave driver - for our trip across to the Medway. I was very tired, thought I was supposed to be on holiday? That being said it proved to be a very good move. Whilst enjoying a breakfast of earl grey tea and chocolate, we caught the ebb of the tide which took us back out to sea and we made great progress. I saw a seal with her pups on the beach, shame I didn't have a bigger lens for my camera, I took a picture with a dot on it! The sun was shining and everything was great..... Then it descended, the big dark cloud, followed by the rain. Ooh my god, what do we do? We couldn't see a thing apart from the Thames sailing barge, tacking perilously close to us. Do we turn back or continue? It was sunny behind us but the course we had plotted looked grim. We decided to continue. It was quite scary, visibility was virtually nil. I was on lookout for boat traffic whilst Martyn tried to spot the buoys we needed to keep us on course. This foul weather continued right up until we reached the last buoy along the coast and just before we began to cross the Thames to pick up the Medway channel. You would have thought you had been transported in time! The sun came out, the sea changed from a muddy brown to a deep green again. Thoughts of Hallelujah came to mind. I was reminded of a similar moment on a trip to Kelso scooter rally with Paddy, we were all running out of petrol in the middle of the night and finally came down a hill with a petrol station all lit up at the bottom!!!
We were quite nervous about crossing the Thames, it's so large and the ships are bigger than anything we have encountered before. We needn't have worried though, there were only about three or four ships in the area and Martyn took us safely through them. We followed the channel into the Medway alongside a huge ship. It was eventually met by tugs boats who escorted it in to Port. It was an impressive sight!
The Medway is very interesting, full of boats of all ages and size. The further south we get the more variety of boats we seem to see. Tonight we are staying in the Chatham Maritime Marina - we would stay longer but at £42 per night, and being unemployed, we can't really afford to so we are looking for somewhere a little cheaper for a couple of nights. The wind is really blowing now and is expected to do so for a few days so we will stay on the Medway for now and see what adventures can find here!
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