You missed one!

What a month January was! Angus, Dave and I were invited down to the London Boat Show to the Marina of the Year awards and not only did we win, but we were the first inland marina to be awarded the very prestigious Marina of Distinction Award! To win it you have to be winner or runner up of Marina of the Year for 3 consecutive years. It was a fantastic day for boating in our area as Aqueduct also took the Marina of the Year title which is passed on when someone is elevated to the higher award. It really does demonstrate the standard of boating facilities in our area which makes me even more proud than just winning it for ourselves! Back at base we've had a surprisingly busy January, marred slightly by an emergency stoppage at Hack Green which CRT seem to have plugged with some degree of success. We've had some lovely cold but sunny days, and of course the obligatory wind and rain but nothing can change the fact that the days are starting to get just that little bit longer again. On the new caravan pitches the builder has got the main part of the loo and shower block up and the holiday lodge pads are pretty much complete for now. We had a trip up to Cumbria last week to discuss the fixtures and fittings for the first one, which has already been sold to one of our moorers. The children are back in the routine of early school mornings and counting down the days until half term (I'm doing that too but for different reasons) and I'll leave you with a funny moment from the other day – Des was given the task of finding somewhere to put up the Marina of Distinction certificate (it's very posh – come in and have a look). After declaring there was no more space and, after much deliberation, he finally took everything down and carefully re-hung the lot. a short time later, whilst standing back to admire his handiwork (and I'll admit it did look good) Angus strolled in, walked over, picked up something from the counter and asked "so where are you going to put this one...?" As every head swung round, Des stood in disbelief looking at one very green, very large award certificate he'd overlooked........back to the drawing board Des....