Monday 23rd Sept
Back home again, as always with somewhat mixed feelings. It's sad that the holiday is over, but I'm consoled by the comfortable bed, the availability of bath and shower, and not having to rely on a chemical toilet! This morning we had what could comparatively be called a lie in, not getting up till eight o'clock. We had a fairly leisurely breakfast, using up the remains of the bread, tomatoes, eggs and mushrooms. Then there was about an hour of packing up and cleaning the boat, and we were away just on ten o'clock.
I went with Alan and June back to Wantage, and then drove myself back to London. Along the way I noticed, as I do from time to time, a car or two parked on a bridge going over the motorway. Does anyone know why they do this, and doesn't it get in the way of other cars?
I stopped for an hour or so at the services on the M4 near Reading — rather good they were, I must say. The place was surprisingly crowded, mostly with people over sixty. There must have been several coach loads of pensioners on various day trips of one sort or another. I'm surprised I didn't see my aunt and uncle, they're great ones for coach trips.
As I write this last entry, it's a little before half past ten in the evening. At some stage I'll copy the journal entries for the past ten days, and make them into a separate holiday journal which I can put, with pictures, onto my web site. I wouldn't really expect a lot of people to be interested in it, except that Nick calculated that a lot of people did visit the copy that he put on his web site, of the holiday we had in 1998, when we went in the big loop from Northampton, through Oxford, down the Thames and up the Grand Union back to Nothampton. Still, that's for another day. For now, it's back to my comfortable bed. A reasonably early night is definitely indicated!