The May Day bank Holiday has brought the boaters out in droves, but we were already tied up after filling with water at the services. Incidentally, the elsan and pump-out facilities are still out of action here at Anderton.
I was wondering why we use the international distress call “Mayday” instead of, say, “Easter Monday” or “Shrove Tuesday”. Well it goes back to the early days of flying and two-way radio and an air traffic controller at Croydon. He recognised that with voice messages now replacing Morse Code, the SOS call requesting assistance was redundant. And who wants to shout “Sos, Sos” into their radio mike… With a lot of England to France traffic passing through Croydon he suggested Mayday, a corruption of the French m’aidez – help me. And it’s now internationally accepted for maritime and aviation transport.
Anyway, we were just filling up with water when Martin on the fuel boat Halsall hove into view, so I picked up another couple of bags of solid fuel. You never know…
He pulled in in front of us, then suddenly the previously quiet canal was thronged with boats.
I’m glad we got in and filled before this lot arrived. Another two were coming down past Anderton Marina as well!
We pulled in again between bridges 198 and 199.
The day started dull and overcast, and it even tried a little rain on for size at lunchtime. But the skies cleared and it’s been a warm, sunny afternoon. While we were at the services a familiar chap was dropping off a bag of rubbish. It was Peter, over from home in Tasmania for a boating summer. He and his wife Jennifer joined us for a brew and cake this afternoon. They’ll see us down on the river later in the week, and I think an evening of hilarity is in store…
Looks like the weather is going to be good for the rest of the week. Lovely.
Locks 0, miles ¼
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