Herbie Awards: first Award Awarded – plus a mystery dead cert.

Ladies and gentleman here I stand

A golden envelope in my hand

Today’s decision was really hard

I open it up and read the card

And the winner of the Herbie Award for Best Gadget 2016 is . . .

the Hausen 12v fluid extractor pump

Hoorya!!  It wins because although you might not need one very often, it makes a difficult and horrible job easy and pleasant.  It works just like you’d want it to, and I couldn’t find anything else nearly as good at anything like the price. I wish I had found it years ago.  Great piece of kit.

Moving on, now I have a problem because today I’m supposed to nominate candidates for our Best Day’s Cruise this year. 

I can recall a lovely day in October when we pootled back up the Oxford canal on out way back to Banbury.  The air was fresh, the sun was warm, the canal was peaceful and the birds were flocking in the hedgerows.  There weren’t even any queues at the locks.

But it wasn’t that day.

It could be the day in February when we set off up the Slough Arm after not having cruised for three months – probably our longest ever lay off.  Sometimes I’m apprehensive after a long break. Will the boat be OK?  Will we still enjoy it? Well I can tell you that it was really good to be cruising again, even though it was only from Slough towards Uxbridge.  Yep that was a good cruise. But not THE one.

Whichever way you look at it there can really only be one candidate this year because that particular day was one we’ll never forget.  The answer is in the next golden envelope waiting for tomorrow.

Plenty more awards to come.  Coming soon, Best Rural Mooring, Best Urban Visitor Mooring, Best Pint of Beer and more.  Stay tuned.