Page 15 - July 2013 Kettle published 2

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15
City & Village Tours: 0845 812 5000 info@cityandvillagetours.com
We sail at 2.30pm from the pier by the bridge that
links Eton and Windsor to start a two-hour cruise to
Boulter’s Lock. Can there be many more impressive
sights than the oldest and biggest castle in the world
sitting above the town and the river? Look for the
Royal Standard to see if Her Majesty is at home. This
is a broad reach of the river full of swans and day
trippers in small motor boats. On the Eton side along
the meadow known as The Brocas are moored the
pleasure boaters in a whole variety of river craft from
narrow boats to big white trophy boats with flying
bridges looking quite regal. You’ll also see folk on
holiday in hired cabin cruisers - some of them
massive great things - you wonder how on earth they
got the hang of that in the standard 20 minutes of
instruction at the start of their holiday!
The Queen is of course a great fan of horse racing and
just out of town is the only racecourse in the UK to be
built on an island - Windsor Racecourse. The pleasure
boats do a roaring trade on race days ferrying punters
the short hop from Windsor. During the London 2012
Olympic Games people were able to park here and
cross the Thames on a purpose built temporary foot
bridge. Not far along the racecourse the river bends
dramatically to starboard where the riverbank is wild
meadow with not a building in sight. It’s a full ninety
degree turn, like a river is want to do at times, but it
seems somehow shocking so close to the civilisation
of Windsor. It’s shocking too for the holiday makers
on their little craft to navigate this bend and find
bearing down on them a pleasure cruiser that must
seem huge when you’re on 30 foot of fibreglass.
Look closely at the helmsman on any boat in our path
and you’ll see some wide eyes! The trouble is that
there are shoals here near the banks, accumulations of
silt that make all but the centre of the channel very
shallow so every boat, of whatever size, gingerly
takes the bend midstream fingers-crossed hoping not
to meet another boat head on. Already so much to see
and we’ve barely set off!
Oakley Court, a gothic house with manicured lawns
running down to the riverside is just like a film set -
something that didn't escape the attention of the
neighbours, Bray Studios, who filmed a number of
their Hammer House of Horror pictures here.
All along the Upper Thames are small islands some
inhabited, most not. Those we pass today include
Queen’s Eyot, Pigeon Hill Ait (both pronounced
eight
) and Monkey Island where Edward VII once
took tea on the hotel lawns with three future Kings,
George V, Edward VIII and George VI. Bray Lock
is a little gem that often does well in the lock gardens
competition: as we pass through the lock we climb
four foot nine to reach the village of Bray, ever
famous for it’s turncoat vicar who kept his head
through the reigns of Henry VIII and his three
children. The Waterside Inn at Bray run by the Roux
brothers is where the royal grandchildren took their
grandpa for his 90th birthday.
Maidenhead enjoyed a rather risqué reputation where
fashionable Londoners motored to let their hair down.
Marvel at Brunel’s famous Sounding Arch Bridge
that was immortalised in JMW Turner’s painting
“Rain, Steam and Speed” and the sumptuous homes
of the rich and famous whose surprisingly overlooked
gardens run down to the rivers edge.
And so we reach Boulters Lock where we disembark.
It’s still a busy lock but nothing like it’s Victorian and
Edwardian heyday when on one Sunday alone 800
pleasure craft, steamers, skiffs, punts and all manner
of launches passed through and the towpaths were
thronged with day trippers out to see the famous and
rich messing about in boats. You can buy tea on
board and be ready to head home by 4.30pm.
This trip is available daily April to the end of
September and the 2014 price is £20.95 per person.
Coach Mileage 15 or 25 and the walking content is
low on the Thames Villages Coach option rising to
about 1500 yards on the Eton walking tour option.