A surprisingly quiet night in Huntingdon aboard The Lady and a slow start before shopping in the Town Centre. My new book was in the book shops but not yet in the library. The cruise downstream to The Twenty Pence Inn on the Old West River where the girls played out until dark at 8:30pm with children from the other boats and Daniel revised his Chemistry before some TV aboard.
Princess Anne, the Princess Royal, is to live separately from a husband Capt Mark Phillips, there are to be new navigation rules for larger vessels on The Thames after the Marchioness disaster and anti-apartheid rallies and demonstrations increased in size and number as the South African authorities reacted with predictable violence and retribution
After our walk around Huntingdon until dusk, Di and I slept well enough in our cabin. We had become rather discouraged by all this unresolved talk about boats and the sight of The Lady’s 35 -foot sister ship, Patience, has only made things worse. Surprisingly, the noise of the two road bridges by the Huntingdon Town Quay was not too bad and did not disturb us. We had a fairly slow start this morning but once breakfast was over, we set off as a family for a shopping trip to the town centre. We had a morning drink together and then I took the girls to the library where I got them two books each on my own ticket.
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No sign of my History of Little Paxton book on the shelves yet despite their purchases, but two of the Huntingdon bookshops had them for sale. We had lunch at the Wimpy which was noticeable by the number of poor people that were there, most of which was smoking heavily which is a notable social statement. Back to The Lady and a long cruise downstream. We worked at the next three locks ourselves then had the next three done for us by the salaried lock keepers. Only one change from our last journey in these parts. The lock-keeper at St Ives was the same twit as before and I berated him this time about the hose on the water tap not reaching the length of the lock to our boat, where we needed the service.! The regular chap at Brown’s Hill Staunch was still there and I chatted to him about boat types and he thought we could not improve upon The Lady and that wooden boats were a good investment.
We eventually arrived at The Twenty- Pence Inn on the Old West River. The girls played out until dark at 8:30pm with children from the other boats. Daniel looked after them whilst doing some revision for his Organic Chemistry. Diana and I had a nice meal at the pub, watching the antics of the girls on the play equipment and then we all came back aboard The Lady to watch a little TV and settle ourselves down for the night. The news today is the sad story of Princess Anne, the Princess Royal, who is to live separately from a husband Capt Mark Phillips. Following the sinking of the Thames pleasure boat, the Marchioness, there are new rules for watch keeping and navigation lights on vessels 40 m and more in length, but I personally doubt their need or effectiveness. The tension in South Africa is mounting as anti-apartheid rallies and demonstrations increased in size and number as the authorities reacted with predictable violence and retribution