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A Year in a Life Perhaps?

"WallToAll"  ... is by no means

the only website under my control.

In the earlier years of this century,

I was heavily involved

with boats and sailing and the sea,

passing on sea lore

and marine methodology

to a younger generation.

The web provided a fine platform

and "Free Webs" a fine tool

with which to reach

any audience anywhere.

 Link to something I did

I built a boat once!

 http://www.pentargon.webs.com/

is an on-going Work In Progress,

detailing my escapades

in a narrowboat, on canals

and rivers of middle England

during the second decade of C21,

meandering along The Lea and Stort, the Grand Union Canal to Braunston, the Oxford Canal between Isis & Stoke, the Thames itself, tidal and non-tidal, the Wey, Basingstoke Canal and a bit of the Kennet by Reading where "Hurricane" Katie  interfered with my 2013 odyssey.  Include also the Lower Thames Estuary, where Pentargon re-opened [enter hyperlink] the River Darent to recreational navigation in 2015 Pentargon's leaving of Dartford October 2015. I spent two idyllic spending two Summers there, surveying tides, its flora and fauna, the biology of the estuary and re-learning almost forgotten skills in hydrology and hygrology. Spot the difference!

 For 2017, plans were hatched to sail from Dartford to Liverpool, then skirt Greater Birmingham to join the Severn. The "Ring" would take Pentargon to the sea at Sharpness, to take a solo passage to Bristol and joint the Avon and Kennet navigations to Reading and London. The ship's log for 19thMay 2017 shows Pentargon on the Staff & Worcs near Wolverhampton ... and on 13th August 2017, Pentargon entered  Bristol Floating Harbour having navigated the Bristol Channel from Sharpness the previous day. Solo! and riding anchor overnight in Portishead Hole  which Hilary Kington has so beautifully illustrated and you can see via the hotlink.  A race against time, which is also against all that is sacrosanct in canal life, sent us right through from Bristol to Reading in three sailing days and that in itself may be a record. The climb at Devizes is chronicled elsewhere ...[HL]

AFFAIRS WITH TIDAL WATERS 

 http://www.kenyajacaranda.webs.com/ ... was my proudest bit of work to date in the voluntary sector.  As PRO of the long-defunct "Mayflower Sail Training Society" one of my briefs was to produce a regular news bulletin for a scattered and diverse membership.  On my watch, it went to the web as well as to papyrus (150 copies a month mailed out). The site's 'raison d'etre' died with the charity and the website is now a repository for the initial draft of " MUDDY WATERS"...

http://www.freewebs.com/kjoperations/  ... The Mayflower Sail Training Society never had an operations manual til I arrived. This site was developed as a repository for sailing lore, methodology and operations centred on the SV Kenya Jacaranda . When that house of cards tipped over due to mind-boggling management stupidity and appalling seamanship, another site became available to WallToAll as a virtual bookcase. 

Another active KJ site is http://www.kjtraining.webs.com/  when some of us realised we needed a means of training existing members and new intake in doing things in a uniform way.  This site now links into "Pentargon".

http://www.greenwichpeninsulahistoricshipsharbour.webs.com/ ... was to have been the biggest, most exciting maritime project I was ever involved in but it 'Went Down The Swanee' through appalling mis-management, corporate greed and a singular lack of vision.  The website remains mine to this day being used to store diverse verbal garbage.

 http://www.freewebs.com/thamesmaritimeheritage/ is another river-based concept which failed to get off the ground due to the breathtaking ineptitude of the principals. I had been retained as PRO and initiated a website but never got a key to the gate.  Currently the site exists as an indictment of the concept that while less than 1% of  people make things happen and more than 9% watch things happening, the real problem is the 90% who "Wonder What The Bang Was" and who make up 99% of the membership of all UK voluntary organisations. 

Mid-decade, I spent time with the London unit of the Maritime Volunteer Service based by Tower Bridge and undertook PRO and training roles there along with active service on a number of powered boats on The River. http://www.mvslondon.webs.com/ was a website work in progress when that organisation began to 'unravel' but I learned a lot about the river from some very skilled river-men and marine specialists during my time there and gathered another virtual bookcase. (roxan )

http://www.southockendon.webs.com belhus1280

http://www.stnicsetallsaints.webs.com belhus1280