Return of the Voyageur!

This picture is a cheat, its standing in for the pictures I risked Catie's life and limb for today and didn't get. In the midst of what has been my best day for many months, my camera refused to take any pictures as the memory card was full...I always carry a spare of course....except that I'd already switched to the spare a few days ago...oops. This was actually taken ages ago in the middle of Wallingford, my boat is no longer this clean and un scratched...

I'd arranged to meet my friends Sally & Colin (& their Kelpie Bramley) this afternoon down at the old Papist Way ferry (hence my blips from there over the last couple of days - reconnaissance!). I took it in stages: got my gear sorted out yesterday, loaded the boat onto the car this morning and then recovered for a while before driving over. Getting the boat up was...interesting, but I managed. I couldn't afford the light weight options when I bought The Kakapo (as she's named) so she weighs a ton and while its true that moving canoes about is more about balance and technique than brute force I have to say I felt every pound of her. It wasn't elegant and I nearly smashed her down on the concrete BUT I managed it! I had a long lie down then filled the car with paddles etc.....had another lie down....then off we went.

Luckily the track was clear up to the river so I was able to put the cars front wheels in the water, release the straps and just roll her in a semi controlled fall into the water...and I managed to do it all before Sally & Colin arrived which was my goal - I was trying to put myself on the spot and find ways round problems rather than just accept help. Today was a test really to see if I am going to be able to carry on paddling for a last hurrah or if time was up. I had no idea how my arms were going to react to paddling; I can't raise my forearms more than about 90 degrees to the vertical, nor my upper arms more than 45 degrees or so without lightening forks of pain then muscle spasms that mean game over - so it was a big unknown today whether I could paddle at all. The good news is that I can but its going to be safe flat water from now on - I've got no power in reserve to get me out of trouble.

We paddled off South past the overgrown World War II pillboxes that dot the towpath, down under Isambard Kingdom Brunel's famous Moulsford railway bridge with its impossibly wide flat arches that every one said would collapse. As we approached it Colin enquired how long I could bore them for with details about it...turns out it was about three minutes.

A little later as we came alongside a pub a hurried boat to boat conference was held on the subject of stopping for an ice cream - this was hailed as a good idea but then abandoned after we failed to work out a method of getting me out of, and back into, the canoe over the raised dock at the bottom of the pub garden. I will have to work out ways of doing this but I didn't fancy trying it out in front of a pub full of onlookers. So we carried on until I was starting to get tired and wobbly then turned around and paddled against the current back to Cholsey.

I attempted to take several pictures: of a couple of large families of swans that insisted on giving us a close escort.....frighteningly close at one point as the mother Swan was definitely warning us away from her fluffy charges, of a couple of coots with their unbelievably cute younglings, of the view up through the gap in the Moulsford double bridge ...and so on. While trying to get an action shot along the side of Kakapo with the other boat ahead of us I finally realised something was up with my camera and tried to fix it. The current, taking advantage of my distraction, pulled us in close to the bank and almost too late I realised we were getting way too friendly with a huge old willow that dipped down into the water....as I swung us around I discovered an unknown talent in my daughter up in the bow - Limbo dancing! She gracefully folded herself flat, backwards as the tree branches came down to gunwale level....and then popped back up. Must be nice to be so supple.

All in all it was a round trip of only about 3 and a half to four miles but I must confess to a feeling of some achievement. I felt sore and tired as we put back in but very, very happy. As the bow grounded I discovered , slightly alarmingly, that my legs were not only numb but seemed to be made of jelly and unable to bear my weight. I was extremely grateful to Colin for pulling the boat up so I could wobble precariously in a half crouch while waiting for enough strength to return to let me climb out. It was at least five minutes before I could come close to straightening up. Without help I would have to have taken some more morphine and sat on the bank for half an hour before attempting to load the boat on the car - as it was I surrendered and let my friends do it for me. A little later, back home, I tried to unload by sliding the canoe onto my shoulders, supported on the portage yoke...it felt like someone had stabbed me through the back of the neck but with knees buckling and boat rocking back and forth I made it the 20 feet or so back into the garden. I did get stuck at this point, unable to bend enough to slide out from under and lower her down...it turned into an inelegant, clumsy collapse....but boat home and stored!

A hard, painful day but the best in a long, long time.