We had heard good things of the local pub in Semington, the Somerset Arms. As our first night in the dry dock was Friday we had planned a walk down to the pub for a meal. It really is a super place, and deservedly busy because the food was very good and the price was reasonable. We thoroughly enjoyed our meal and might go back on Monday for the quiz night.
We can’t imagine how we managed to do the blacking and the rest of painting ourselves in the past. We seem to have plenty of work on our hands with the normal paint touching up that we used to do after each day’s blacking was finished. Maybe we are getting soft! We have been very lucky that the weather continues mild. It was very windy last night but today was perfect painting weather: sunny with a drying wind. The three pigs on the property were gambolling around. One is going off to be slaughtered on Tuesday so I was pleased that it was having such a lovely day! Liz and Ian will eventually be selling home reared pork as well as their own free range eggs to boaters.
Because we don’t want to damage the new blacking while it sets we are not letting any water out of the boat which means that even the shower water has to be emptied into a bucket. Luckily we have become accustomed to being frugal with showers. I even managed to wash and condition my hair tonight without the water rising above the level of the shower base, though it did fill two buckets for emptying outside. Its quite quick to empty the water from the shower with a big car washing sponge. (Normally it would have to be pumped out so if the pump isn’t operated the water stays in the shower). On the other hand, because we are plugged into the electricity, we can watch television, or vacuum or I can even dry and straighten my hair without Alan muttering ominously about the batteries.
Statistics so far:-
3057.93 Miles, 2051 Locks, 197 Swing Bridges, 118 Lift Bridges, 58 Tunnels