Half Term and Boat Work

Eric has been on "Half -Term Break" this week so Alex took a few days off from work too. The original plan was to have the boat hauled out to do a little work on her and then go for a short cruise on the river and perhaps into the next river to spend a day but the weather did not co-operate with the second part of the plan as we are having another system come through with heavy winds.

Wednesday was a beautiful day with sunshine ALL day long, which is rare. The yard hauled the boat out with the crane at 8:00 am and we had 24 hours to work on her before they put her back in the next morning.

 Alex serviced a seacock which had been giving him trouble for awhile and Eric and I did a quick paint job on the bottom. It was a very quick job because we ran out of paint before we finished, but we painted the worst spots with anti fouling paint to stave off the critters that like to cling to the boat bottom. Alex plans to haul out again after the winter so I'm afraid we'll have to do a better job again then.

With the boat work done but too much wind for a comfortable cruise on the river we went to plan B for the rest of the mini break which was to take a couple of little day trips to explore some areas near Woodbridge. 

The first was Southwold Pier. The pier has the usual shops, ice cream vendors and a traditional arcade, but also has the "Under the Pier" Arcade, and that was what we were there for.  It is a room full of handmade arcade attractions designed by Tim Hunkin, somewhat of a local celebrity best known for his TV series "The Secret Life of the Machine" which Alex and Eric love to watch. (The best attraction was "The Alien Probe" you can watch a video about it here. ) 

There is also a water clock in the middle of the pier that "performs" every half an hour. Every half an hour  when it "performs" the men drop their pants and pee into the toilet. No, we are not in Kansas anymore! 

After we  experienced the machines and had a few laughs, we went for a walk in Southwold which is a charming little seaside town with a beautiful church, a brewery and lots of posh restaurants and hotels. 

We walked past all those posh restaurants with people eating in the windows to the end of the High Street to the local chipper and had our lunch there. 

The next day after Alex did the requisite boat work (with minimal swearing this time, so all went well) we set out again to explore a retail spot I had heard about as a  possible  place to sell my merchandise called "Snape Maltings".   We were a little surprised when we got there and a little puzzled at first as to what exactly it was, but came to the conclusion that it is an old brewery that has been converted to shops and cottages on the Auld River.

 We looked around a bit at the gift shops to see if any may be suitable for my stuff then sat on a picnic bench on the river and had our sandwiches and decided to go for a walk on the footpath, always the best form of free entertainment! It was beautiful and the sun came out for the entire time we walked. 

Half term is over, Eric will go back to school and Alex back to work and I'm busy preparing for my London show next weekend! I'll report back after that.