Seeing a man about a dog

Today we had another day out looking at sea boats. Little yachty motor-sailory sorts of things for bobbing up and down on the lumpy stuff. First stop Brighton Marina to check out a Colvic Watson 26 on brokerage there. Yep, it's nice; it looks like a boat... the trouble is, whatever boat I look at I can see the merits of, insofar as I can see any merits in the sort of boat where you can't get off and walk.


To get to the brokerage, we had to transit the surreally named 'Brighton Marina Village'. I've seen some bleak expanses in my time but I really think this took the biscuit. So inhuman, so ersatz, so bloody uncaring about anything - aesthetics, friendliness, nature - except hoovering in the maximum number of tasteless inhuman consumer-clones and their money. So this is what Black Rock and the sea swimming pool disappeared under all those years ago. Asda-town, plastic onion domes on stuccoed quasi-pubs, dying palm trees, wind tunnel boulevards. I have seen the eighties, and it is still horrible.

But we still had a lovely afternoon, bacause after that, we went on to the outskirts of Southampton to see a man about a dog. The Hon Sec of the Sea Dog Owners' Club, in fact, who had very kindly offered us the opportuinity to have a look at his 30' Sea Dog, a boat type which Jim was very taken with on paper. We met John and Audrey at their house, along with another man who had just bought a Sea Dog and had come to inspect John's gimbles, and were all driven to the marina where the boat (Two Tails - I think it's a law that all Sea Dogs have to have amusing canine-related names) resides. On board Audrey plied us with tea and lovely rock cakes while John showed us all the features and wrinkles of the boat, and his many ingenious modifications. They were lovely people, and we had a splendid time, and we have extended an invitation for a reciprocal visit to Chertsey, which I hope will be taken up. The Sea Dog was a very nice boat too.
And I have decided that I want one of these, if anyone knows where to buy one.