Goodbye to The Lady with the final cruise to leave her on the St Ives sales pontoon
Goodbye to The Lady with the final cruise to leave her on the St Ives sales pontoon

An early start cleaning on The Lady until Sally and Percy arrived to discuss our motions and subjects for actioning through the committees of the District Council in the year to come, after which I could then resume. Then the final cruise on The Lady to leave her on the St Ives sales pontoon. England lost 2-1 to Uruguay and thus ended an unbeaten run of 17 matches, beef sales have fallen 40% as a direct result of the "Mad Cow" disease.

 British Coal has warned that 7,500 miners will lose their jobs with more pit closures and New Zealand ketch, Steinlager, sailed into Southampton to win the 33,000-mile Round-The-World Yacht Race. The inquest jury investigating the Boeing 737-400 M1 Kegworth plane crash have given verdicts of accidental death after the wrong engine was shut down

Not a bad night but all the family were still suffering from bronchial and chest complaints. The breeze had dropped markedly from yesterday, but the dryness and mild weather had, in my view, created a bumper crop of dust and pollen and everybody is wheezing as a result. I was up quite early this morning, and, after breakfast, I put in an hour and a half of exuberant cleaning on The Lady. I started from the roof downwards and scrubbed with a brush and detergent, rinsing off with a hose as I went. By 9.30am, I had just about finished this task and then Sally and Percy arrived for a pre-arranged meeting to discuss our motions and subjects for actioning through the committees of the District Council in the year to come. It was a particularly good session which I thought was a better way of proceeding than just putting up motions piecemeal in an un-coordinated way. We all had action items to progress as a result and knew what we were trying to achieve.

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I then prepared some letter heading for them both to use and went back to my boat cleaning. We had an early lunch and, Joan having finished cleaning the boat by this time, Diana came down to put the boat curtains up whilst I went round in a dinghy and scrubbed the hull. This was a very arduous and unpleasant job as there had been several dead fish and a dead duck festering in the water alongside the boat for some time and the smell was quite putrid. As I was finishing this, Sally returned to get my help with the wording of her meeting agenda item and then I came in to have a cup of tea before setting off. Diana's friend, Linda, was there and Di took lots of pictures of The Lady before I eventually left and then of me leaving. The day had turned quite ideal for cruising. It was dry and sunny but not too hot and the breeze had dropped to be no hazard to navigation whatsoever.

The only problem I had was a couple of inexperienced (and, in the case of the man, intoxicated) boat hirers getting in the way at the locks. They shut the first lock on me, failed to wind the paddle down after using it, and then moored up right in the middle of the next lock landing stage, with him fast asleep in the back and her off walking the dog! I eventually got them to help work the lock and then accompanied them through all but one of the remaining locks to St Ives. The only compensation was that the lady (unfortunately grossly overweight) was wearing the most revealing split shorts which really needed "G" string pants rather than the (admittedly very brief) ones that she was wearing. She was bra-less under a loose top as well as she wielded a lock handle, and all this was obviously too much for her mate who had taken to the booze. I eventually locked through onto St Ives Town reach at about 7:15pm and so I called Diana on my Cellnet telephone to get her to set off and pick me up. I tied up The Lady a quarter of an hour later at the boat sales quay and reckoned that my boat was very keenly priced compared with some there.

Once home, Di got me a few sandwiches and a cup of tea after all my exertions at the end of what had been an extremely rewarding day. I was so tired tonight at the end of such a tiring day that I just watched some international football on TV hoping to be uplifted by it. Unfortunately, it was the game where England lost 2-1 to Uruguay and thus ended an unbeaten run of 17 matches but at least they got it out of the system in a friendly and before the World Cup. Cattle and beef sales have fallen as a direct result of the "Mad Cow" disease. 40% less cattle came to market, limiting the fall in prices to 6%.

British Coal has warned that 7,500 miners will lose their jobs under new rationalisation plans and Arthur Scargill has called for industrial action to try to forestall it. The irony is that the worst cuts are to come in the Nottinghamshire coal fields because of the cost of removing the high sulphur content, where the break-away miners’ union are in the majority and undermined the national strike. New Zealand ketch, Steinlager, sailed into Southampton to win the 33,000-mile Round-The-World Yacht Race. The inquest jury investigating the Boeing 737-400 M1 Kegworth plane crash have given verdicts of accidental death, but still nobody can answer the vital question as to why the wrong engine was shut down.