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'A tale of two newcomers, a barge and a dog'
At 9.00 on 29th June 2007 we arrived at Canal Walk in Hungerford in bright sunshine, despite the dodgy weather forecast. We quickly identified the Hannah from the delicious aroma of frying bacon and boarded eagerly, hoping to be offered a full English breakfast, only to find to our disappointment that Peter and Sue had almost finished their breakfast and hadn’t saved any for us! Instead we were directed to move our car to the station car park in town before the guests arrived, with a promise of a cup of tea on our return. This we duly did and on our return the guests had begun to arrive already, ahead of schedule and in separate cars. This meant that the process of ensuring that everyone would have transport awaiting them at Great Bedwyn at the end of the day was rather more complicated than usual, but we got sorted out eventually.
The party were from Sailability, and included people of all ages with various different disabilities and degrees of mobility, and their carers. One lady was totally wheelchair-bound, but most of the others were able to get on and off the barge with assistance, and help out at the locks, which they very much enjoyed doing.
We set off around 11am, a little later than scheduled but we were in no hurry. We had been told that this was one of the prettiest stretches of the canal and it certainly was. We saw families of baby mallards, coots and moorhens, yellow water lilies about to burst into flower, and all amid the beautiful rolling Berkshire countryside. The weather stayed fine almost all day, so we were very lucky.
At the first lock we moored and many of the guests disembarked to help. There was some milling-about while we tried to remember whether the paddles should be raised or lowered, but we worked it out between us – John’s valuable training was not wasted! – and were at last on our way. We were much more confident at the next lock and the guests were keen to have a go themselves. Later, some even had a go at steering the barge, under Peter’s supervision, on the straighter stretches of the canal.
Finding somewhere to stop for lunch was not easy, because all the mooring places were close to locks and not intended for long tie-ups. Eventually, about 2pm, hunger got the better of us and we moored just past one of the locks. This meant that another boat wanting to use the lock had to tie up alongside us temporarily, but this did not cause any problems; everyone is very friendly on the canal. During lunch we chatted to the guests, who were keen to find out more about Rotary and several asked the meaning of “Vesper” on our polo shirts. The tin of cookies we’d brought to share went down very well.
We set off again around 3pm, now very confident about the locks. The wind had become very strong and gusty, making steering the barge quite demanding, but the sun still shone. The rest of the trip passed very quickly and all too soon we arrived at Great Bedwyn. On disembarking a group photo was taken and we said our farewells, hoping we will all be able to meet again next year.
In case you are wondering about the dog in the title, we felt we had to give a special mention to Gussie, a very well-behaved lurcher who belonged to the mother of one of the guests. He enchanted all of us, and according to the visitors’ book, he had a lovely day:
“He has chased the rabbits in the hedges, supervised the crew at the locks, scrounged the left-overs at lunchtime, and dozed in the sunny patches of the cabin – a perfect day out!”
Neither of us was sure how we would cope with an event like this, as we had never been involved with disabled groups before. But we enjoyed the day so much and found it so rewarding, and everyone was so friendly and easy to get along with, that we can’t wait for next year – when we would like to do two days (preferably with an overnight stay in the 10-star hotel that Peter and Sue say they went to! I think they are keeping that one a secret).
The week after our trip we were delighted to receive via John a very nice letter of thanks from Pam Gee of Sailability. It was good to know that the guests enjoyed the trip as much as we did.
Linda and Stephen