Posh houses and a hitch-hiker

The Thames from Windsor to Marlow is really beautiful and we've had another good day's cruising.

There are some fantastic hotels

and extremely big, expensive houses

 Even this boat-house was rather grand

But this huge thatched house was my favourite of the day

Boulters Lock had some spectacular floral displays.

These Angel's Trumpets were stunning and I wish we had enough room on the boat as I was seriously tempted to buy one.

We've seen an awful lot of cormorants today. This one was sunning itself while another 6 were perched on the adjacent posts.

Just past Cookham Lock we were flagged down by a very well spoken elderly man in a rowing boat. He had a tiny battery powered outboard engine on the back but had flattened 2 batteries and his third and last was dying with another mile or so to go. He asked us for a tow to the next lock where he was meeting his wife at the very posh Compleat Angler Hotel for afternoon tea and we gladly obliged. He wasn't dressed like this when we picked him up though. He changed out of tatty shorts and t-shirt into slacks, shirt and tie and blazer en-route which was no mean feat in that tiny boat.

He was really enjoying the ride and even came up Marlow Lock with us, much to the amusement of the lock-keeper and the 2 huge cruisers who came up with us.

We dropped him off at the hotel but first he made sure his wife got plenty of photos of his unorthodox arrival. I hope he enjoyed his afternoon tea it looked very nice on the website - starting from £27.50 each

Bye for now