Zum See Cruising–August 2011 to Dec 2011

We decided to return to England on August 10th 2011 but would stop over a couple of times on the return journey. We drove from Sant Carles to Figueres in North East Spain as Joan wanted to see several places where the artist Salvador Dali lived and worked. We first visited the Salvador Dali museum, Teatre-Museo Dali,  in Figueres which is a very strange and pleasantly surprising museum. 

Next we went to Pubol where Dali had bought and renovated a castle for his wife Gala.  Finally we visited his house at Portlligat which is on a wonderful bay and marina.  We had lunch in the picturesque town of Cadaques nearby.

Next we drove to Valence in France where we decided to stay overnight especially as we had been recommended a restaurant there.  Maison Pic has a Michelin starred restaurant, a hotel and a less formal bistro Le 7 where we ate in the open air courtyard; the ambience and food were very good.

The following day we set off to the UK staying at Vitry-le-Francois on the way to the ferry.

We went back to the UK thinking our house was ‘sold’, as a potential buyer had made an offer, which we negotiated,and both agreed to a speedy conclusion; the buyer then prevaricated for more than 3 weeks!!

In the meantime we decided to go into London and see the boat handling at the ATYC event in West India Dock and then go to some art exhibitions afterwards. We drove to West India dock and met with some Bray club members who were there by boat, watched some of the boat handling competition and then went off to Tate Modern to see their latest  exhibitions.

The following week Darren and Debbie were cruising up river and had invited us to join them; due to other commitments we could not join them until the Thursday of their trip so Darren organised a multi day car park permit for us at Abingdon, we drove there, parked the car and then joined them on Unwinder. 

We spent a very pleasant 4 days with them on the cruise, eating the first night at a nice Italian place in Abingdon, having a BBQ the next night on board near  Wallingford, and then stopping overnight at Henley before making it back to Bray on Sunday.

The following Saturday we had the opportunity, courtesy of the RYA, to board a spectator boat on the opening day of the America’s Cup races in Plymouth; we drove the 220 miles from our house to arrive there by noon to board the boat.  We had a really enjoyable afternoon watching the races close up.

Following this event we drove the 200 miles to Cookham to join the annual, and enjoyable, Bray BBQ at the upper island in Cookham.  We got there about 8.30 pm, parked the car and then walked down to the river edge where 2 Bray members, John and Roy, kindly came and picked us up in their dinghies to ferry us to the BBQ site.  Fortunately Darren had saved us food from the BBQ as everyone else were already eating. Following the meal, as is normal practice, we all sat around the big bonfire and sang ‘Rule Britannia! We stayed overnight on Darren and Debbie’s boat, Unwinder, helped clear up in the morning and then were taken back to the other side of the river to pick up our car and drive home. One of our members, Malcolm, had carved a fallen tree trunk into a bench.

The following weekend we decided to go to the Southampton Boat Show on the preview day Friday; we of course visited a number of chandleries, the MDL booth for a glass of wine and the Broom stand which was also hosting the Broom Owners Club.

We were particularly interested in seeing the two new Broom models the 370 and the 455. To our surprise we saw some boat friends, Mick and Carol Bicknall sipping champagne with Mark Garner the MD of Broom as they had just signed up for a new Broom 370 to be built to their spec which would be displayed at the 2012 London boat show.  We understood they had recently sold their boat and bought a motor home but found they could not resist the river so then decided to buy another boat; you just can’t keep people off the water once they have been there.

The next day we attended the MDL Marina Bray marina September party with music, tents and food which was very enjoyable with traditional fish and chips, chicken and chips, sausage and chips laid on by MDL, served from an old tram. The weather was a bit iffy but it was great fun.

On Sunday we met for lunch at the Oxford Boat House with an editor friend of Joan’s from Los Angeles who was working on the feature film ‘Snow White and the Woodsman’.  Joan had not seen her  for about 20 years so they had a lot to catch up on!  After lunch we took her back to her editing suite at Pinewood Studios. 

After all these events we were back to the house sale; following further questions from our potential buyer he  tried to reduce the price.  We told him, thanks but no thanks, we are going back to Spain. 

We left on Sept 23rd arriving back in Sant Carles September 24th 2011. On the way we stopped at a small hotel in a town called Montlucon which featured a real Ferrari sitting in the hotel lobby; the hotel was very red!

We spent a very pleasant 2 months in Sant Carles taking the boat out occasionally,

fixing some items that needed work, starting a Petanque (‘Boules’) event each Thursday at the marina with other boaters

and enjoyed a Halloween party laid on at the marina restaurant by the restaurant staff.

During October we went out with another boat, Jenny Wren, to a port called Las Fuentes just south of Sant Carles.  The trip down was a bit lumpy but OK.  We moored up in the port and then the winds came in quite strong so we put out as many ropes as we could to keep the boat stable as we were moored just inside the marina so were getting the wind and the sea swell.  Next day we motored back to Sant Carles with a smooth sea state, no wind and glorious sunshine, a bit different to the previous day!!

On another occasion a friend who had just bought an Aquastar boat at the marina and was wanting to give her a run down to another port south of Sant Carles.  About 10 of us volunteered to help him out and then we all set out for the trip. Upon arriving at the port we moored up, and then went and had a great lunch on the quai side before returning late afternoon back to the marina; incidentally the ‘new’ boat handled very well.

Whilst in Sant Carles we found out that an  American friend of Joan’s and his wife were planning to visit the UK, France and Venice. We organised for then to stay in our house whilst in the UK and to meet up in Venice where we were planning to drive for the Venice Biennalle art event.

At the end of October we (me, Joan and our cat Chili) set off toward Italy in our car.  We stayed overnight at Golf Juan near Cannes.

 

The next day we visited some art museums and moved a little further along the coast just past Nice to Villefranche sur Mer where we stayed in a small hotel overlooking the marina.

  On our drive to Cannes we saw a significant number of police vehicles racing along the motor ways and check points set up because this was just a day or so before the G20 meeting in Cannes.

Fortunately we managed to continue our journey the next day without any delays and arrived in Venice; parked our car in the Tronchetto car park on the edge of the city.  We then dragged our roller bags, one for us and one for Chili as well as carrying Chili in a carry case. We caught a Vaperetto boat bus to take us close by our hotel, Chili didn’t seem too bothered having spent much of his time on a boat anyway.

We reached our hotel and then, having got Chili settled, went and saw a lot of art over several days as well as riding lots of Vaparettos; so art and boating!! During one evening we also met with Joan’s friend from the US, and wife, Lindsey for dinner; it had been about fourteen years since they had last met.

We spent four days in Venice touring the  Biennalle art event.  Of course we had to sample the famous Bellinis at Harry’s bar

On our way back to Spain we stopped off in Turin to visit Artessima another art fair.

We had been watching the weather; when we left Sant Carles and it a lot of rain was forecast.  Fortunately we were driving and staying in front of the rain going to and whilst in Venice.  All through the city they were setting up the raised platforms for pedestrians expecting a heavy downpour at any time. We did not see any of this until we started to drive towards Turin when it really did rain on the way there. After visiting  the art fair whilst it was pouring down but then we had an excellent meal in a restaurant near our hotel, Trattoria l’ Oca Falo.  The set menu included a chef’s starter, 3 antipasta , 4 main meals and selection from the dessert cart.  Each course was a small plate creating a banquet of delicious variety.

Once we arrived back in Sant Carles we started packing the boat up for the winter; we played some more Boules and visited the Barcelona boat show.  A friend of ours from the marina joined us and we even got to look at a couple of motor bikes whilst there. The boats on the water were at Port Vell and a shuttle bus to took visitors to the indoor part at a new convention centre which also had a lot of smaller boats and a few chandleries; we didn’t think the chandlery section was as good as at London or Southampton, but it was enjoyable anyway.       

On November 19th we made our way back to the UK staying near Montlucon in France overnight as our half way point.

On arriving back we organised some essential house maintenance activities, visited one of Joan’s art friends opening day exhibition, near Hungerford after which we joined the social activities after the Bray Cruiser Club AGM.

The next few weeks were spent re-registering with movie agencies, attending a local chorale event and a local beer festival during one afternoon followed by the BCC Christmas social in the evening and preparing ourselves for Christmas

On December 21 we drove to Basel to visit family for a couple of days and then to Zurich to visit other family.  We had a great time there and enjoyed the visit including seeing the four grandchildren and their faces at opening their presents.        

We returned from Switzerland on December 27th and on the 28th had a lady come to see the house for the second time so we will see where this possibility goes; unfortunately we had a buyer that had started the buying process of our house but pulled out on the day when we were exchanging draft contracts as their buyer mysteriously pulled out at the last moment.

After the Christmas festivities we were suffering BWS, (Boat Withdrawal Symptoms), and were looking forward to getting back to warmer Spain so we decided at the last minute to splash out on a New Years boat trip on the Thames in London to see the New Years fireworks.

We set off to London by train arriving at Embankment, the boarding point for the boat, and once we went on board were greeted with a welcome drink.  During the five hours event we cruised up to Albert Bridge back around to the O2 arena and then to the firework display at the London Eye.

We were served a five course dinner listening to a live jazz band with after dinner dancing.

 

At midnight the boat positioned itself just near the firework display and we were treated to a spectacular event as well as a glass of champagne to celebrate the New Year

The event was not cheap but well worth it. Once the boat got back to let us disembark we found we could not board our Underground train at Embankment, just across the road from the mooring, as they had closed the station so we had to walk quite a way through London, finally getting a cab to the train station and getting on the 2.30 am train (the last one) back to our house with 3 minutes to spare; we had originally been trying to make the 1.30 am train!!

Well here we are now in 2012.