Nice pics, TallGuy! Haven't got mine on-line yet, but they don't really add very much.
I was the first one to arrive, surprisingly, since I was a little late. But I hadn't even finished ordering my pint when BRL turned up, shortly followed by TallGuy, and Penguina and Smurph (who were delayed because they had to take their shopping home first
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As we drank, we started to plan the day. It wasn't much of a plan, but it involved following Paulo's original plan of getting on a boat at some point in the afternoon. Then Saab called, and told us he'd be joining us in about an hour. So we changed the plan, and decided to wait for Saab before getting on the boat.
We did our best to be noisy, obnoxious and foul-mouthed in the mean time. We managed to get a few glares from some of our fellow drinkers who had come out for a quiet pint by the river. Then Saab turned up to help us in our mission. But despite that, and despite Penguina spilling her pint all over the table, we left the Founders Arms several hours after we arrived, completely voluntarilly. Where's Grim Reaper 14 got to - Grim, we need you, we can't get ourselves kicked out of the pub without you!!!
As we arrived on the jetty, the boat pulled up, and we were told that there would be no more trips that day. Damn! But then another boat arrived, so we got on that one instead. It turned out to be a much more tame journey than the catamaran we'd planned on riding on, but we had some good commentary all the way up to the London Eye, and then across the river to Embankment.
But there was no sign of BRL or Saab
The chances of BRL falling overboard without causing a large enough splash to get some attention were pretty small, so I wasn't really that worried. And, sure enough, a few minutes later they were back on deck, ushering us towards the back of the boat, where they'd arranged a "cockpit visit" for us. We watched as the pilot skillfully brought us in to embankment peer, asked lots of questions, and probably made a complete nuisance of ourselves, but it was fascinating. We followed the visit with a debate on whether it was easier or harder than landing a plane. Much more precise, was the conclusion, but much slower too - so difficult, but in a different way to our own landings.
We were closer to being successful at getting thrown out of the next pub, but that was only because we sat ourselves down in the restaurant area, and were warned that we'd have to leave if the tables were needed by diners. Well, diners turned up, and we re-arranged ourselves to as to only be in their way a little bit. But all this talk of food was making Saab hungry, and he led us into Chinatown for a meal.
Excellent food. Pity about the service. Smurph had finished his main course before the rest of us had been given our starters. I think we ended up missing a couple of starters and a soup or two. And I'm not sure whose soup I had, but I know that Saab had mine. Still, we washed it all down with a couple of beers, so it didn't really matter, and once the bill was settled we, erm, went to find more beer.
Smurph, who knows a good pub in every corner of London, let us down here, by leading us to somewhere which was selling beer that tasted old, and cheap nasty vodka that came out of a Smirnoff bottle but definitely wasn't Smirnoff. We stayed long enough to watch the couple sitting next to us almost start undressing each other, but by now we were too loud for our own good, and once they heard us sniggering they decided to move on, and we finished our drinks and headed to another pub until closing time.
All in all, an excellent day out. The bash was very tame by Private Flying standards, probably because there weren't as many of us as usual, but that made it a very pleasant, sociable day out. And there's talk of another one in December, to help Iainpoll celebrate finishing his exams, so watch this space!
FFF
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