“Roland, would you mind telling me again about your boat trip, in detail, so that I can tell my blog readers?” I asked with pen and paper in my hands.

“No, of course not, but where shall I start?” our friend from Brisbane chuckled at the memory and sat down on the dry seat I had proferred (it had stopped raining and he was having a smoke on my studio patio whilst I sat the other side of the threshold with the door open between us).

“Start at the beginning,” I suggested, “and I’ll prompt you when necessary.”

“Well,” began Roland, “we arrived at Polly Steps at Teignmouth, on the harbour side of Shaldon Bridge. Geoff (my brother-in-law) drove the trailer onto the boat ramp while Chris (that’s my husband), James (my sixteen year old nephew) and I were already knee-deep in the water in order to manoeuvre the boat off the trailer. Three attempts and we were launched successfully. Captain Geoff sat next to the motor on the back seat, James was on the triangular bow seat and Chris and I were in the middle seats. On the floor of the boat was a conglomeration of ropes, plastic bags, oars twice the size of the boat and a cool bag with three cans of beer.”

“So not much floor space?” I queried.

“Not with all those ropes,” he shook his head and gave a wry smile as if he was remembering something funny.

“And what was the weather like?” I thought you readers might like to paint a mental picture of the scene.

“Oh yes, the weather,” Roly understood. “It was around five o’clock in the afternoon and sunny – balmy even – not a cloud in the sky. The tide was coming in but the water was shallow as high tide was eight o’clock. We were headed for The Passage House Inn at Newton Abbot. As we negotiated the narrow channel for a mile or so up the river Chris and Geoff pointed out various houses and the village of Bishopsteignton set below the sunlit fields on the right hand side. It must have been around there that the shimmering on the water made it ever more hard for us to pick out the channel and the muddy riverbed appeared closer and closer as we looked over the side of the boat.”

“Did you all see that?” I wondered about Geoff.

“Yes, except for Geoff!”, Roly laughed. “Through his expert navigation the propeller started churning up the mud… which reminded me of my own experience of running out of water in my boat a few years ago…!

“Oh no,” I said, remembering that same incident.

“Yes, we could all feel the shallowness of the water and James said to Geoff, ‘Granddad, tilt the motor forward to raise the prop,’ but it was too late; by the time he’d finished his sentence we’d hit the mud full on. We couldn’t go anywhere so Chris, James and I got out to push the boat back into deeper water.”

“Did Geoff laugh too?” I asked, considering that Roland was laughing while talking.

“He couldn’t understand how it had happened and suggested we push the boat into deeper water,” our friend from Australia chuckled. “Young James, being an Oxford rower, said, ‘Hold on, I’ll row us out into deeper water!’ We got back into the boat and this time James took up position in the middle and put the giant oars into the rowlocks. James’ arms criss-crossed as he attempted to row and he complained, ‘Granddad, these oars are too long and need adjusting’. Geoff said, ‘I’ll just saw them off then when we get home!'”

I laughed.

“James started rowing, pulling for all he was worth,” Roland continued, relishing the memory, “and we were going nowhere. We looked over the sides of the boat into the water and saw that we were stranded; inadvertently, we had pushed the boat directly onto a submerged tree trunk! But the ultra long oar came in handy when James used it, gondolier-like, to push the boat off the tree trunk.

Geoff started the motor but let James take over. ‘You see if you can do any better!’ Geoff told him. James negotiated his way into the right channel and headed toward Passage House Inn (where we sometimes stop for Chris to read Mum my blogs). The river was too low for us to disembark at the jetty so we pulled onto the mud and Geoff struck anchor on the grassy bank. Being safety conscious, Geoff covered the anchor with his high vis jacket to prevent people from tripping over it.

Two beers and pleasant chats later we re-boarded and set off to advance further into Newton Abbot. The channel became smaller and smaller and the foliage greater and greater until we ran out of navigable water – it was like a jungle.” Roland paused as he reminisced.

“Like the ‘African Queen’?” I saw it in my mind’s eye.

“We did mention that,” Roland agreed, “also when were pushing the boat.”

I thought of Humphrey Bogart and the leeches.

“Two hours after we’d set out we headed back,” Roland wanted to finish his story. “The sun was lower in the sky and the tide was almost full, so no more running aground. We passed The Passage House Inn – didn’t go in – and went on to the boardwalk wharf jetty at Coombe Cellars. It was about eight o’clock. The air was cooling as the sun went down and lots of people had finished their dinners. We enjoyed our one drink as watched the ripples on the water, the long shadows and the lovely reflections of the trees on the river. It was absolutely beautiful.”

“Any more mishaps in the homeward leg of your journey?” I had to ask.

“There was no heading peacefully back to Polly Steps, as you know Sally,” Roland chuckled. “Geoff shut the motor off as we reached the boat ramp and Chris, James and I jumped into the water to secure the boat and prevent it from bashing into the ramp. Geoff stabilised the motor, pushing it forward to stop the propeller from scraping the corrugated concrete surface. So the three of us deckhands were all wet in water up past our knees while Captain Geoff was nice and dry still in the stern of his boat. Young James observed, ‘Granddad, you haven’t even got your feet wet during this trip!’

At the same instant Geoff was disembarking from the boat, one leg over the side and in the process of bringing the other leg over, when his remaining foot became entangled in the conglomeration of ropes, plastic bags and over-sized oars… Suddenly, breaking free from the restricting anchor rope – and with his mobile phone in his hand – Geoff fell sideways into the water!”

“And was he completely submerged?” I asked with devilment.

“Completely,” laughed Roland, “and the funniest thing was that his hand came out of the water first! ‘My phone! My phone!’ he called out as he raised his head.”

“Did you have a wonderful time?” I asked.

“It was absolutely brilliant!” our old friend enthused. “I wouldn’t have missed it for the world… and no doubt the couple of beers made it even merrier!”

“Thank you Roly.” 

Now don’t feel too sorry for my brother-in-law because his lovely new Samsung Galaxy 6 Edge mobile phone arrived today and he vastly pleased. Every cloud has a silver lining!