Another watery blog

It’s the 4th of July and the power is off at my house so I can’t bake the berry pie that I was planning to make this afternoon. SO - I decided to wander over to the Pump House to see if they had power. They don’t - apparently it’s a break in the line. So I decided to settle in to one of their couches with a ginger beer. and write a blog post They’re playing music on someone’s computer; the wait staff and chefs are hanging out and a few customers are outside drinking beer. [My waiter friend Adam - who, it turns out, is an avid reader, particularly of American literature - just handed me two books to read ... Don Delillo’s White Noise and a book called The Fourth of July by Peter de Bolla!]

Several of you have asked about the Diamond Jubilee, so I thought I’d try to get caught up on the blog by starting with that weekend in early June. Alison, Mark and I took a late morning train to London, so that we arrived in the early afternoon. Alison and I immediately headed for the place where we were meeting Sue Kieffer for coffee (Sue is a fluid dynamicist/volcanologist who was visiting Durham, UK, for a few months). Mark, sweet guy that he is, took our bags to the hotel that we were staying in, north of the city. By the time Alison, Sue and I had chatted about geophysical flows for awhile, both Mark and Sue’s partner Jerry had found us, and we all headed off to see the big sailboats that had come in for the Jubillee... they jammed St. Katharine’s docks (yes she spells her name correctly) and lined the Thames below (downstream of) Tower Bridge. The boats at St. Katharine’s included many famous British yachts, such as the Gipsy Moth and the Suhaili (both round-the-world boats) as well as Sceptre, a yacht that sailed in the 1958 America’s Cup (apparently the first year they sailed the 12 m class). And of the larger ships moored along the Thames, I was happy to see my friend the Matthew [which is now back in Bristol’s Floating Harbor].

That night, Alison Mark and I went to the Globe to see Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing... in French! Part of an international Shakespeare festival that has included troops from all over the world. Had a nice dinner at the pub in the theater and then found our seats - we were late in getting tickets so we were all sitting separately in the very steep and narrow gallery seats perched almost on top of the stage. Below us was the pit, where people stand in the open air to watch the play. Because the entire theater is open to the air, they have blankets for rent... given that it was a rather chilly (and eventually rainy) evening, I took advantage of the rental! Alison, as a Canadian, is fluent in French... Mark and I both had English editions of the play with us which I did look at occasionally. Actors were great and were clearly enjoying playing at the Globe (and interacting with the audience in the pit). Definitely a fun experience. Walked back across the Thames to the tube station in the dark and rain and made our way underground toward Hampstead.

Next morning we had breakfast at a bakery we’d noticed the evening before... turned out to be an excellent place for breakfast so we grabbed some lunch supplies there before heading back into the center of the city. We emerged from the tube at Westminster and decided to work our way upriver from there, on the theory that the crowds would be thinner at greater distances from a tube station, and that we’d rather be at the beginning than the end of the flotilla route. There were crowds along the river even at 9 in the morning, several hours before the flotilla was due to start. But there were also large screens lined up along the river showing footage from the Queen’s coronation and other notable events of her reign, so that there was plenty to see as we wandered toward the Chelsea Embankment, where we eventually found a riverside place to hunker down for the wait. Which is what we did. We’d all brought books to read ... I think it’s the longest I’d ever waited for any event - but as I told Mark and Alison, I’d never been to an event that hadn’t happened for 250 years!

Some background (off the top of my head... I feel handicapped without access to the internet!). Apparently flotillas down the Thames used to be part of festive occasions related to the monarchy. In particular, the organizers envisioned reproducing a famous painting by Canaletto (which is now in the National Gallery) from the Lord Mayor's parade in the 18th century, including a reproduction of a yacht in the painting... the new yacht was christened the Gloriana (see photo above). However, the Queen was not on the Gloriana, but was instead on another yacht that had been completely refurbished for the occasion. Our vantage point actually afforded us fairly good views of both yachts... and even the Queen and her family (see below).

But I must say that my favorite part of the entire event was the initial flood of “man-powered” boats... of every shape color and description, manned by people in colorful costumes and flying flags and banners and standards... it really was an impressive sight, as were the Dunkirk boats that followed... and the narrow boats and the boats with orchestras and ...

The rest of June flew by in a blur... from the trip to Clermont-Ferrand, France to the trip to Eugene. France will have to wait for another blog. But I will end this one with my return to my end of the harbor. Because this weekend was the Baltic Wharf Sailing Club (BWSC) Regatta, which was a sufficiently entertaining affair that I thought I’d add an account to the blog. Particularly because my friend Rupert was in the safety boat for Saturday morning’s race - with a camera - so I can include a few pictures of me sailing (all the photos below are by Rupert, except for the one of him, which I took at the BBQ that evening). Regatta unfolded as follows. Saturday morning was a “head of the harbor” (HoH) race, which entails sailing down the harbor to the center of town and back (see map... also labeled are my house 18RM, the Cottage Inn CI, the Grain Barge GB, and the location of bacon sandwiches BS - keep reading!) and then sailing around a simple course at our end of the harbor until the OOD (Officers of the Day, who, that morning, were Rupert and his son Tom) decided it was time to stop. Well, actually, they usually try to run the race for about an hour, but make sure that everyone has made it back. And since I was crewing for Ben in his RS400 (RS stands for Racing Sailboat) we ended up going down and back in a record (for Ben) 35 minutes and therefore had several more laps to complete. Which tells you how windy it was. You can see from the pictures below that Ben (who is much younger and more athletic than I am) likes to sail standing up (when he’s not hiked out).

The afternoon continued to be quite gusty - and the race was a rather complicated course at our end of the harbor... Ben and I did manage to set the spinnaker several times, AND put on a show for the folks spending Saturday afternoon at the Grain Barge, because the downwind port mark (it was a gate mark) was such that we were pulling down the spinnaker and rounding the mark and then tacking just before crashing into the Grain Barge. Again we sailed the course for an hour... not quite in time to miss the rain that had been threatening all afternoon. But it had already been decreed (by Chris) that the BBQ would be in the “Dutch barn” where some of the boats are stored (it has a roof but no sides). BBQ included tandoori chicken and salmon as well as hamburgers, veggies and salad. My contribution was chocolate chip cookies (with chocolate chips imported from Eugene) - they disappeared rapidly! I’ll have to get someone to send another shipment of good quality chocolate chips :)

Sunday was still gusty and gray... morning race was in the cute little colorful Access boats - two adults can fit in the boats so several of us doubled up (I sailed with Pete). Started with a sail down the harbor for bacon sandwiches and tea/coffee (our commodore phoned in the order ahead of time so they were ready for us). We then raced back up the harbor... it was pretty funny - no one was used to sailing the boats and the winds along the harbor are really flukey, so everyone was in the lead at some point during the race. But it turned out that Pete and I (in the orange boat) ended up crossing the finish line about a foot in front Kelvin and Jackie (in the yellow boat). Winds continued to be gusty, so eventually Chris decided to call the afternoon race but said he would be safety boat if anyone wanted to just go for a sail. I went out with Pete on his Lark and it was exciting... we only sailed for 30 or 40 minutes before we were tired!

A final note... it’s continued to be a social week. On Monday night I didn’t leave the University until after 8 (it had taken me awhile to get going in the morning). Was walking home past a pub called the Three Tuns (a tun is apparently an old English unit for a wine cask - close to a cubic meter). I’d noticed that they had an Irish session night every Monday but had never been... I heard the musicians tuning their instruments so decided to stop by for a beer. It turned out to be a lot of fun. Lots of good music, including several guys with great folk singing voices who would sing traditional songs interspersed with the instrumental music. And then there was the woman who sang a beautiful Basque song. And the people in the corner dancing Irish sets. And all this in a tiny pub crowded with people, windows gradually steaming up and obscuring the rain outside as the dark encroached (not until well after 10pm). And the cheerful guy at the door as I left, who said that he hoped I’d come back... I said certainly!

Tuesday evening was the monthly Tuesday steak night with the sailors (which I finally managed to make it to). At a pub called the Knights Templar (we ARE in England), near the Temple Meads train station. An evening of sailing talk and occasional questions about geology (Rupert made the comment that by the time I left their conversation would have converted to geology interspersed with sailing!.. actually, I think his comment was that they’d soon be discussing the strata of the Avon Gorge). There was a video projection of the tennis matches at Wimbleton on a large screen, so we could also keep track of the tennis. All English eyes are on Murray, the local boy, who advanced today to the semi-finals.

And this afternoon the power did come on in time for me to make a 4th of July dinner for Alison (Mark’s away) and Juliet (another volcanologist/geodesist in the department)...