Saturday 3 February 2024

A Big Boating Adventure - Part Four

 I have so many things to catch up with in my blog that I have been worrying about where to start, but my human guardian Polar has helped, by treating us Bears to a new book for our Libeary.

It's called Paddington at the Carnival and is about Paddington Bear going to the Cavalcade Festival at Little Venice.  The pictures include all sorts of little details that Hanley Bear and I recognised from our visit in the spring, such as the little blue bridges and the island with willow trees in the middle of The Pool.

We were there in April and May, arriving several days before Cavalcade.  Our human guardian Polar and I took the train home for a couple of days, to collect post and check on the garden and allotment, and she did some things for work too, while Grizzly and the other bears did jobs on Uppie the narrowboat.  When Polar and I got back, we all had a great day out at the Tower of London, which I will blog about another day, as this post is all about Cavalcade.

The Cavalcade Festival has been running since well before I became a Boating Bear - in fact, this was the 40th anniversary of the first Cavalcade.  Polar and Grizzly had been once before, ten years ago, but our friends Mrs Chrissie and Mr Alan had been lots of times, because Mrs Chrissie did lots of publicity and organising for the event, which was easier when they lived in London but now they live in Worcestershire, which makes things trickier!

Cavalcade takes place over the May Day Bank Holiday weekend and there are things happening every day. There are stalls selling food and drink, hats and clothes, all sorts of crafts and souvenirs, draws, tombolas and raffles, and information stands for many good causes.  Best of all, The Pool at Little Venice fills with dozens of narrow boats, decked out in flags and bunting, which is an absolutely marvellous sight. 

I was a very busy small bear, as I was reporting on the event for our Inland Waterways Branch Facebook page and for Bear Twitter.  It was so busy that I had to ask Polar to carry me around in the Bear Bag, as I was worried about being stepped on or accidentally kicked into the water, and I had a much better view from there too.

 

We had lots of visitors from Polar and Grizzly's friends and families over the weekend, including several of human cubs who really enjoyed their days looking at all the boats and picnicking beside the canal.  We bears made sure there was always plenty of cake on board for our visitors, and for snacks between hugs for us. 

And I spotted a very famous bear visiting another boat, but didn't manage to catch him for an interview.  

On Sunday, all of us Bears put our best boating clothes and our boaters' belts on.  Some of the humans on the boats dressed in their Sunday Best too, although Polar and Grizzly hadn't brought bonnets or waistcoats and bowler hats - we hope they will if we go again!

Sunday was a busy day, with more visitors, the Blessing of the Boats and our human guardian Polar taking part in the Boat Handling Competition.  Unfortunately, she had to do her manoeuvres at the same time as the Teddy Bears' Picnic was happening in the park.  We were very sad that we couldn't go, until she told us we were going to be helping her with the competition!

We sat in the lifebelt on the roof and waved to all the other boaters and the crowd as Polar steered our boat around the island in the middle of The Pool, avoiding the trip boats and the other competitors.  She did very well bringing the boat alongside the judges' landing stage to shake hands and started reversing back across The Pool very neatly, but made the mistake of waiting for another boat coming out to start the competition when she was half way across and the wind caught our bow and spoilt our reverse between the marker buoys.

We felt sorry for Polar, as she was trying to be polite and kind, but she was still runner up in the Women's Boat Handling class (out of more than two!) and won a bottle of prosecco, so she was quite pleased.

On Sunday evening there was a lovely parade of illuminated boats around The Pool, and all the boats moored in The Pool had lights and bunting out for the occasion.  Our boat didn't take part so we could wander around with our human guardians enjoying the spectacle.  I thought it was the prettiest thing I had ever seen on the canals, and all of the other bears agreed.

Monday was the last day, and it was bright and sunny again.  We had more visitors to show around and were pleased that there was still plenty to see, including musicians on some of the boats.

    

But during the afternoon, boats started drifting away and the stalls started packing up.  Polar and Grizzly helped to pack away the IWA gazebos and did sweeping up and litter picking.  

We felt sad that the festival was over but it certainly wasn't the end of our adventures, as Polar and Grizzly had decided we weren't going to go straight home, but would explore some waterways they hadn't travelled before.

 

But I will tell you more about that in another post or two!

Tuesday 26 December 2023

Merry Christmas!

 Merry Christmas, friends!


We are at home for Christmas this year.  If you follow my blog, you will know that sometimes we spend Christmas on our narrowboat, Uplander II, but this week the weather has been windy and wet, which is not nice for boating.

We bears enjoy getting the house ready for Christmas.  We made some of our decorations last year, including some bunting from old Christmas cards and gardening string.  We made some with bigger triangles for decorating human houses, and small bunting for our Bear Basket and to send to our Small Bear friends.

We also love helping to put up the Christmas tree.  Polar and Grizzly's tree is a very old artificial one (over 30 years old) and gets stored in the loft in sections, so the branches always need straightening out again when it come back downstairs.

Then we help to drape the lights around it, and the baubles and tinsel, although it looks even better when there are some presents gathered underneath!

Polar was really pleased to have home-grown sprouts from the allotment ready for Christmas dinner this year.  On Christmas Eve, Endon Bear helped her to pick some evergreens to make a nice table decoration.

Polar helped us to put out our Christmas stockings, in the hope that we might get some little presents, because we have tried to be good bears this year.  

 

Then our human guardians lit the little Angel Chimes.  We love these, although we are careful to keep our fur away from the candle flames. 


We were tucked up in our Bear Basket early on Christmas Eve, so woke up bright and early on Christmas Day and checked our stockings for little treats.  Polar had made some new sock jumpers for the "Pub Bears" who used to live at the Rising Sun, Dougie, Mac and Wade.  Mac still needs some trousers if he is going to come out on adventures with us, but Polar says she will try to make some for him soon.  We think they would enjoy being boating bears as they used to live near the Macclesfield Canal.

Grizzly fetched the presents from under the tree for us and our hooms and we started to open them.  Our friend Tour Guide Ted had sent us some nice things and we had a very big parcel from Polar, that we decided to save until last.  

We had given Polar some of our pocket money to buy Grizzly a pair of woolly gloves, but we didn't manage to get Polar a present, which made us sad, but she said it was enough of a present to get lots of hugs from us when she needed them this year.

Dudley Bear had a little badge for the Dudley Canals Trust.  He said he would love to have a trip on the little boat that goes through the tunnel near the Black Country Museum and into the big caves underneath, and then have tea and cake at the Gongoozler restaurant. Polar says that would be a great day out if we're in Birmingham on Uppie again this year.  Mac found a pack of playing cards that he thought would be good for taking on the boat too.

Charlie Bear found a bag full of little chocolate, bear-sized Christmas puddings, which we are looking forward to eating, and there was a little bag of M&Ms for the cubs.  

 

There was a chocolate bear too.  We aren't sure about eating bear-shaped chocolate - we might have to get Polar or Grizzly to break it up so it doesn't look like a bear any more!

Then it was time to open the big parcel.  We thought it might be a cake, although it was very heavy.  It was hard for us to move it about to get to the sellotape and unwrap it.  

When the paper came off, we all cheered - it was a lovely collection of all of the Paddington Bear stories!  Polar said she could read them to us as bedtime stories, and the bigger bears in the hug could read them to the cubs.  We love hearing about Paddington's adventures, so we were all very happy with this present and gave Polar and Grizzly lots and lots of hugs.

All of the Hug came downstairs for Christmas tea, including Old Bunny.  Polar hadn't made a Christmas cake this year, but she had made trifle with home-grown raspberries for tea!  Then we settled down to watch Christmas television shows - the cubs hid behind Polar when Dr Who was on!
We had a lovely day and hope that all of our friends have had a super Christmas too.

 




Tuesday 19 December 2023

Home and Away

Christmas time for humans comes at a time which is also special for Small Bears.  As we reach the shortest day and longest night of the year, we think of our wild cousins, especially those who have to survive the winter by hibernating, who we wish safe sleeps until the spring.
It's also when we hear from many of our Bear friends, with cards and little gifts, and of course we send cards and treats to some of our friends.  We have made some bear-sized bunting out of last year's Christmas cards this year and hope our pals can use it to decorate their Bear Baskets.
 
Not all of the Hug are at home this year.  Tunstall Bear, who has always dreamt of being an airline pilot and seeing the world, is in Australia this Christmas! 
Tunstall got the chance to travel to California with our friend Hattie the Otter, and then on to Victoria State in Australia with Oliver Bear, who happened to be at LA X airport at the same time as Hattie and her humans.  To help him with his journey, Tour Guide Ted organised a suitcase and passport for him, and Hanley took his photograph for it.
Polar took Tunstall Bear for a special journey around Stoke-on-Trent to remind him of some of the special places there, and they bought Potteries presents for him to take to his friends.  There was an exhibition in the museum called "Around the World in 80 Dolls" which was useful as Tunstall could ask them about the countries they came from.
After a final visit to his home town of Tunstall (which is the furthest north of the six towns of Stoke-on-Trent), we had a special tea with all of the bears, Old Bunny and Nutley Squirrel.  The next day Tunstall was coming with me to Southampton.  Grandad Polar (Polar's dad) was in hospital at the time and we were going to see him before meeting Hattie.

Hospital visiting was afternoons only, so Polar took us to look around her old home town in the morning.  We saw the Bargate and parts of the old walls, and watched some of the boats in the docks, and then we caught the bus up to the hospital to tell Grandad Polar all about where we had been.  
We told him about Tunstall's upcoming trip to America and Australia, and about our sight-seeing in Southampton, and we gave him hugs.

The next morning we went to Winchester to meet Hattie the Otter and "Her", Hattie's human guardian, and our friends the Berkshire Bears with their human guardian who we call Gecko.
  
Tunstall was very excited about his journey, but very nervous too.  He almost decided not to go after all, until the Berkshire Bears introduced him to a tiny little aviator bear called Amy, who wanted to go flying as well and needed a bigger bear to look after her.
Tunstall was also reassured that Hattie was a very kind and sensible otter, who made him feel safe and promised to look after him.  I still felt very sad when it was time to leave him, although it cheered me up a little when I saw that Winchester had a traffic bollard decorated like one of Clarice Cliff's "Bizarre" pottery pieces, as I knew Hanley Bear would be delighted.
Hattie and her humans looked after Tunstall very well during his visit to California.  He had adventures including visits to national parks, riding on streetcars and going to music festivals.  They had a successful rendezvous with Oliver Bear at the airport too, so Tunstall flew on to Australia with him and has been enjoying even more adventures there, including going to a concert in Melbourne by Mr Paul McCartney.
We were thrilled when we got a Christmas card from him this week.  We guessed it wasn't from any of our UK or European friends because it had tropical birds putting up Christmas lights on the front.  There was a super message from Tunstall, who is still having a marvellous time.  We are sure he will have lots to tell us when he comes home, but we don't know when that will be yet, as there are plans for more adventures in Australia.
He might even see if another Bear friend will invite him to visit on his way back to the UK!
 
Another member of our hug who was away from home this autumn is now back with us.  Huddlesford went to help the Lichfield and Hatherton Canals Restoration Trust again, joining them in September for the Heritage Gathering at "his" junction.
This is a very special event with lots of vintage narrowboats, cars, lorries, tractors and traction engines and we had been hoping to go, but Polar had booked a special holiday for us that clashed with it.

Hanley Bear went to Lichfield with Huddlesford, visiting the Staffordshire Regimental Museum while they were in that area.  The Bears enjoyed their visit, although it always makes us sad that humans have wars and fight each other.  They are not as wise as bears.

Hanley said it was a very good museum for small bears, as there is a woodland walk to enjoy once you have gone through the scary replica trench, and some military vehicles that small bears can climb on.  

He and Huddlesford also paid their respects to a mascot from the regiment who shared a name with a dear old bear friend of ours, before meeting Mrs Christine from LHCRT, who looks after Huddles when he goes on his work placements, at Huddlesford Junction.

This weekend, Hanley, Endon and I went to Lichfield with our humans to collect Huddlesford to bring him home for Christmas.  We found there were already quite a lot of bears in the city - I guess they were visiting friends and doing their Christmas shopping.

 

Polar and Grizzly had arranged to meet Mrs Christine and Huddlesford at the Cathedral.  We all arrived outside at the same time, which was very lucky!

We bears had not been there before and we thought that it was a wonderful building.  It has three spires and lots of little figures carved on the West Front but, because it is over 700 years old and is made from quite a soft red sandstone, there is usually some restoration work going on somewhere (this time it was to the main spire).

 
Mrs Christine had suggested meeting there because the annual Christmas Tree Festival was taking place and LHCRT had decorated a tree for it.  There are dozens of trees, decorated by local schools, businesses and charities, and they are all very pretty.

As soon as we were reunited with Huddlesford and allowed out of our Bear Bags, we bears went to explore.  Huddles found a tree sponsored by St Giles Hospice, where he was once a charity fundraising bear (we know this because he has their name on his right back paw), but at first we couldn't find the LHCRT one. 
Then we realised that there were trees along both sides of the cathedral!  About half way up along the south side we found it, with Ogley Bear from LHCRT looking after it.  It was very cleverly decorated with a long, blue ribbon which represented the canals, and this had little narrowboats on it and lift bridges over it.


And there were sign posts for the country parks and walking trails, and even an LHCRT bauble. "The humans have all worked very hard on our tree," said Ogley.  "I hope we get lots of votes in the competition!"

That reminded us that Polar had bought us a token each to vote for our favourite tree, so we climbed up to the little box where the tokens go in and all voted for the LHCRT one.

There was a marvellous model narrowboat underneath the tree, which was just the right size for us bears to squeeze into, so Polar could take our photograph.

Then it was time for Huddlesford to say goodbye to Ogley Bear.  "We'll have to get Polar to make you a sock jumper to keep you warm over the winter, pal," said Huddles.  He asked if Ogley wanted to come with us to find somewhere to have cake, but Ogley said he was looking forward to hearing some hymns sung during the service that was about to start.  

We are sure that was very nice, but we were feeling hungry and, with our keen little noses, could smell lemon and blueberry cake in a small restaurant just down the hill.  Luckily, our humans decided to have some lunch there so we got to celebrate our reunion with Huddlesford exactly as small bears like to do - with lots of cake.

And we are sure there will be even more cake when Tunstall comes home!