Rainy Night from Gweek «

July 25, 2010

Rainy Night from Gweek

Filed under: General Bloggery — admin @ 10:54 am

It had all been arranged, one of my Uncles was down in Cornwall for a weeks holiday and wanted to see what we did out on the rivers with river images..
Uncle Richard was Kind enough to sort out an outboard for us when we first set up River Images and were struggling to get everything together… in fact it was basically him and my cousin Simon who made the whole thing possible for us so we wanted to thank him and show him how beautiful the Helford river was while he was down here.

He’d brought with him the tender and engine from his own Yacht so we all decided to meet up at Gweek and await the incoming tide.
Of course this is Cornwall, and as such is prone to rapid weather changes and today was no exception and the tide finally arrived into the creek along with the rain..
I (ever the optimist) decided it would soon pass over and by the time we were out of the creek and down towards Bishop’s Quay it would have cleared and be again a pleasant evening .. How wrong can you be

WE set off out of Gweek followed closely by Shin and Aidan in his boat and Richard and Charlie in their boat.. by the time we hit the Seal Sanctuary corner we had the umbrella’s up and the light had dropped to almost darkness making photographs all but impossible..
First encounter on the sandbank was one of the Grey Heron’s looking rather bedraggled and rain soaked and sorry for itself… so much so that he couldn’t even be bothered to fly off as we approached…

Grey Heron looking fed up and bedraggled by the rain

Across the river in the channel as the river was still quite low on the tide and the usual small waders had gathered on the corner… a good few redshanks were sheltering under the overhanging trees…

Redshanks under the shelter of overhanging trees

Well contrary to my thoughts.. the weather was in fact worsening and the wind was now funnelling up the river making it rather uncomfortable to say the least…
I had a quick chat with Leanne and we made the decision to head for the shelter of the swinging Kettle.. a favoutie little spot opposite Bishop’s quay where for years an old kettle has hung from a tree over the river which you could use to boil over a fire in the fire pit and make some tea.. and after all this time we found someone had taken it or simply thrown it in the river… some people are just unbelievable!!! if anyone has an old boiling kettle we can have.. the type with a spout, then we’d be happy to have it toreplace it and hope the t**ds ur will have gone home and it will hang there for another few years…

Anyhow we headed into the shelter there and gathered under the tree’s and enjoyed the peace and tranquility of the river regardless of the rain…

We stayed there for about 15-20 minutes and the rain just kept on coming down… thankfully we were dry under the old Oak trees but we eventually decided to call the trip off and head back with the tide and the wind to Gweek…
I grabbed a couple of shots of the Egrets and swans on the other side of the river and denied my urges to head over to Bishop’s Quay and we launched the boats again umbrella’s up and headed for the boatyard…

More Sheltering from the egrets while the swan's swim past

Richard and Charlie making the best of it

Aidan Ferries Sinead in her waterproof Poncho up the inside of the river

Charlie on the Helm with the Cap'n under the brolly

Well we finally made it back to the vans and got everything stripped down while the Girls made Tea.. the timimg was actually great as Glyn Jennie (my Aunt) and Sally (My Cousin) arrived back to collect Richard and Charlie just as we arrived back..

They soon packed up and decided to head off back to the house for warmth and to get dry.. I think regardless of the weather they had a chance to see what the great appeal was for me and I think underneath it they enjoyed the time on the river… Sadly the weather didn’t get much better for the time they were here so we didn’t get a chance to repeat it under better circumstances but hopefully they can enjoy it through the blog as many of our city dwelling friends do…

We sat under the big Brolly and watched the rain and the ducks drinking Tea until it was too dark to see much and then we headed home…

I can’t help it but rain or shine I find the river a beautiful place to be and can’t wait for the next trip…