Sat 6th and Sun 7th July
Blimey, it’s been hot! At the moment it’s 29 C in the boat. I must get that fan out from under the dinette! Yesterday, the hottest day of the year so far, we subjected ourselves to the torture that was the Stratford River Festival. We went on the train from here, a trip of about 20 mins. It would have been £3 each way for both of us but we didn’t pay on the way there. The ticket collector never appeared on the train, so we went to the ticket office at Stratford to buy tickets and he only charged us to go back.
Obviously Stratford was rammed with people, it is a popular town any way but with the river thing going on it was really busy. The river was teeming with boats of all sizes from punts to a large trip boat.We had a cursory look round the stalls but didn’t find anything Earth shatteringly interesting. We had a chat with the chap from Kate Boats of Warwick. Hire boats have come a long way even since we were hiring. The food stalls were rather pricey although Ken thought he had struck gold when he saw something for 50p. Unfortunately it turned out to be duck bread! After a hot pork, stuffing and apple sauce roll (£4 each) we went for a walk along the river. However the undergrowth was so high it was a bit difficult to actually see it.
By now we needed a sit down so we went to The Red Lion and sat in the garden. Two couples came and sat behind us and one of the chaps was behaving like he was in Ibiza or Benidorm. He took off his shirt, slathered himself in sun tan lotion and practically laid down in his chair. He was pouring lager down his neck like it was going out of fashion and making stupid comments. We got fed up with him and the terrible service behind the bar after a while and went elsewhere.
There were so many people in the streets it was virtually impossible to walk along the pavements. Mind you it was virtually impossible to walk along the roads too! It’s a good job we didn’t want to go in any shops because they were also packed. Not the best day to visit Stratford for misanthropes like us really.
We came back on the 14-25 pm train and spent the rest of the day lolling about, watching tennis and trying to keep cool. All Hell broke loose later on as the, nearly empty, moorings all filled up with, mostly hire, boats and the peace was shattered! There were engines running, engines revving, stakes being banged in, kids shouting, people up and down the tow path and music blaring out until about 10 pm! Misery guts packed up his fishing gear early.
Today it has been hotter than ever and we have done the square root of bugger all! Apart from a trip to the village shop and the pub. Of course I watched the tennis this afternoon as well. I have a pile of ironing to do but can’t bring myself to switch the iron on in this heat!
Tomorrow we are off to Stratford by boat this time and are hoping there will be a mooring in the basin.
