Health and Safety seem to have missed this little gem so far!
The Royal Standard flying in the breeze - it was Garter Day and so the Castle was shut on Monday - we heard on the news that night that Philip was coming here to convalesce, so presumably the flag will be here for a while, presuming the Queen stays with him I suppose.
We had a lovely warm evening that day and I got this shot from out of our hatch since this life size model was poised there. It's a Hurricane and was presented to Windsor because the chap who designed it came from here (I think).
I've got loads of shots of the Castle but won't put too many on, I promise - but here John is smiling, and that's really unusual in a photo so it had to be included.
Here's St Georges Chapel - this is where the ceremony was held yesterday and we could hear the singing across the town - it was lovely.
We watched the changing of the guard ceremony but to be honest we were both very disappointed. It was really slapdash and we were expecting military precision at it's best. Considering who was at home and might be watching out of the window you'd have expected better. We were stunned at the number of petite women guards. Both of us thought that there was a height requirement for the regiment but apparently not. All a bit of a let down I'm afraid.
After lunch following our trip around the castle we headed off and all along the river, where it follows Windsor Great Park there are no mooring signs alternated with these! They really don't want you to moor there do they? Slightly more intimidating than the usual 'Private No Mooring' signs.
We found some decent moorings next to the 'Bells of Ouzeley' another pub mentioned in Three Men in a Boat, but apparently the original got bombed and the one now standing is a new version. It was typical that here we were, moored opposite a pub and we were too full from lunch to eat and there was no-one in the area to visit us. We shall remember this in a few days time when we are hunting a pub in Guildford where we can moor for my Mum to visit us!
Anyway back to the picture - we took on some sub-letters at the mooring. As we were about to take Paddy out for his evening walk, a skiff turned up with 2 rowers who were booked into the hotel behind the pub and were nervous about leaving their boat, we were more than happy to have them tie up against us and Paddy guarded both boats last night!
They turned up as promised this morning, and it turned out that Marcel was writing an article for the 'Lonely Planet' magazine and James was his trusty friend taking photos and generally helping out.
While we were getting the boat back around ours, we discovered they had a stowaway! Alexander Beetle - a beautiful stag beetle well over an inch long. We got him settled back on land and here he is acclimatising himself to his new terrain.
Here they are leaving us - Marcel rowing and James waving to us - they'd come down from Oxford since Friday and were hoping to get to Hampton Court today - good luck lads, hope you made it and remember to let us know when the article is coming out.
We went for a walk around Runnymead and saw the JFK Memorial.
The Magna Carta Memorial.....
.... and eventually after a long walk uphill through the woods, the Air Force Memorial.
John went in and had a good look around and took this photo of Runnymead and the Thames from the top of the tower.
After this we had a well earned cuppa and a bun at the cafe at the bottom of the hill and got back on the boat and have moved on and are now moored at Laleham - we'd never heard of it either but it's after Staines and before Shepperton. A very good mooring and FREE!
We found the boat today that we'd been told about to get fuel. He is based at Windsor and was in Staines today - he cruises up and down this stretch and if you're on a narrow boat it's far easier than trying to get into any of the marina's, which are full of tupperware tubs. He's not a bad price either for this part of the world and I told him I'd give him a plug! The boats name is NB Merchant if you're in the area.
Tomorrow we are going to have to explore a boatyard or marina though since elsan points are very few and far between - it's all pumpouts on the river apparently. Our map shows an elsan point just before we get to the River Wey so hopefully we'll find it - things are getting desperate here!
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