Just returned home from an exhausting 2 days at the Hawkesbury Junction protest. Well, it feels like 2 days! A flotilla of 6 boats from Trinity left the marina on Friday evening at 4.30 and cruised the 3 hours to Hawkesbury, battling everything from wind and rain to dive-bombing ducks attempting to roost in the trees! Great fun and a lovely night time cruise - it's amazing how different the canals look lit up only by headlights and the interior cabin lights. Arrived in time for a quick shower and then we all 'hit' The Greyhound for the rest of the night!
Saturday morning and we began to move into position in the basin. By 12.00, no fewer than 20 boats including 6 working boats were completely blocking the basin, making history, and the press were assembled for the photocall. Approximately 100-150 people were also assembled with an excellent turn-out from the local village of 'non boaters' who wanted to support. Much placade waving later and the press left leaving the boaters to retire to the pub! A while later and some of the boats began to drift off home, zig-zagging up the cut into the sunset and so the Hinckley flotilla made the decision to return home as well. As we cruised further away from the protest, the sun slowly set, the temperature rapidly dropped and the wind considerably increased! We finally arrived back to the marina in a howling gale at about 6.00 this evening. All in all, a fantastic day where we, along with hundreds of others at venues right around the country and abroad made a clear stand. Look out in the press for pictures and reports.
My father was involved with the Kingston protest where David Suchet was in attendance. Apparently this also went well and he phoned me at one point with the conversation becoming extremely difficult over the honking of horns from his assembled mass of paddle steamers, GRP cruisers etc etc. He did manage to catch a brief conversation with David Suchet and to pass him a picture I sent him via mobile phone of the Hawkesbury protest to which David scribbled a note of 'well done' and signed it for me - I have attached a picture of that, above, along with a picture of my boat at the Hawkesbury protest and a photo of our Australian friends who also supported the cause on our behalf.
Watch the BBC news reports here.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6182654.stm
2 Comments:
Hi Andy,
Congratulations from the west coast of scotland on what appears to have been a very successful day with much publicity on the main news throughout the day. One hopes that there will be some constructive feedback from the government in the very near future.
Cheers
Many thanks for the comment. Let's hope for something positive from DEFRA!
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