This was a re-run of a cruise the SPCC had done some ten years previously, some of the boats and crews from that returned for the 2016 cruise.

One odd feature of the trip was that 11 boats sailed out of Limehouse but only ten returned – no we didn't have a disaster in a lock – one of our number was joining the trip down the Thames as a prelude to sailing across the Channel to Calais.

They had intended to go round to Ramsgate to meet up with their motor cruiser support and pilot boat but the weather forecast was excellent from the day we arrived at Queenborough so they phoned the pilot and arranged to meet off North Foreland the following day. That narrowboat safely crossed the Channel and is now happily cruising the French Canals.

The route and planning seems quite easy, out of Limehouse on a high tide, turn left, through the barrier, past the Woolwich Ferry, under the M25 QE II bridge for an overnight at Gravesend. Following morning carry on downstream and turn right at Isle of Grain for the Medway.

Simple – if one is looking on a Google map or similar – not quite so easy when one looks at the Admiralty Charts. Major shipping lanes to Thames Haven and Sheerness Ports, sandbanks extending up to a mile and a sunken WW II ship full of explosives!