Whan that Novembbr, with his shoures soote

The droghte of Sommer hath perced to the roote

And smale fysshes maken melodye,

That slepen al the nyght with open eye-

(So Pryketh hem Nature in hir corages);

Thanne longen folk to goon on outinges

And palmeres for to seken straunge strondes

To ferne halwes, kowthe in sondry londes;

And specially from every shires ende

Of Engelond, to Ely they wende,

The hooly blisful ryvvere for to seke

That hem hath holpen, whan that they were seeke.

Anyway, yes, where was I? It was the Ely head again, once known as the Ely Small Boats Head, but no longer. We have a ladies IV+, a Mx Quad, and a M VIII, racing in various divisions. When I got there is was weirdly empty with only our trestles to reveal our presence; the middle division with the IV+ and 4x- had ended up going off rather late, and come back rather wet, though it was not rainy just a bit grey. Ely was the usual industrial wasteland chic.

Here we see our heroic crew (if you’re wondering where the heroic 4x- or IV+ are, well, they carelessly didn’t take pix of themselves): from the bows, Ondrej, Jon, William, Sam, Steve O, Ian, Harry, Tom; Manja.

Here’s a list of all the crews, from Conor:

Richard - MasF 1x - 25:11.8 (23:54.8 adjusted)

Women’s Four - 25:58.4

Mixed Quad - 22:16.3 (21.18.3 adjusted)

Composite Quad - 12:46.5 (short course, 12:24.5 adjusted)

Men’s VIII - 19:06.1

From which I see there were boats there I didn’t even know about. Full results on RowClock. There were three Open VIII’s, in order Bedford, us and Nines. Both Bedford and Nines were tardy to the start line; Bedford started in front and stayed there; Nines slunk off and we were “chased” by Tabs, but we dropped them. The row was fine; decent quality and reasonable effort but with a slight air of unreality about it, at least for me, I’ve no idea what anyone else thought. We came second: well behind Bedford who looked Young and Fit and Rippling with Glossy Muscles; and comfortably ahead of Nines.