We had six major trips on Polly Anna, the logs of which are listed below – I generally wrote them up during the voyages. However, we spent many weekends just pottering about in the vicinty of the marina. I wrote at the time:
The first of these was the very next weekend after getting her to Bugbrooke. A space for us had materialised in the marina, and we wanted to take the boat to a boatfitter to discuss stage one of the refitting plan. My mother joined us, only a couple of hours to High House Wharf and back, but at the end of the journey I blightly turned into Bugbrooke marina without hardly touching the sides. Little did I realise that it was pure luck; when a wind is blowing it is quite a feat to get a boat of 63′ in. In fact, on the next trip we made such a hash of it we discovered that the winding hole just north of the marina could be used to turn our boat, even though it is marked as 60′!
In the time before our first holiday, we had visited Weedon twice where the food at the Crossroads hotel has become such a firm favourite of Fiona’s that I can’t persude her to try any of the other pubs, and Stoke Bruerne where the Navigation Inn (with lots of childrens attractions) and the trinkets in the canal museum are my daughter’s favourite. We were going to do great things at Christmas, but the boat was firmly frozen in!
Spring Bank Holiday at Milton Keynes
London and the Tideway 2