What are the chances?

Posted on November 6, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

There are some moments in life that remain etched in your memory. We might not realise until something triggers that vivid picture, as if a film is replaying a scene in slow motion. For me it was a friend posting a photo of their mother on Facebook…

It was winter and I think it was raining. I was sitting in the concourse of our university building. It was a general meeting/hovering area with low vinyl covered seating arranged back to back in two squares. Long windows looked onto the railings which my bicycle was locked against, wedged in beside a string of others, and beyond that loomed the concrete slab of the student union. The college shop, jammed with stationery and sweets, framed one end of the space and a wide corridor was on the other side. It was a good place just to ‘hang-out’ if you’d had enough of the library or wanted to meet someone or kill time before a lecture (pre mobile phones).

As ever my canvas bag was bulging with folders and notepads and because it was nearly the end of the day I was thinking about mustering up the energy to go out into the cold and cycle home. An older lady in a long dark pink coat and white hair caught my attention in the corridor. She had a large handbag clutched against her and paused to look across at where I was sitting. I smiled absentmindedly at her but she looked passed me and continued down the corridor studying the various notice boards lining the walls as she walked. A couple of minutes later I slung my bag across my shoulder and headed down the corridor towards the main entrance. As I rounded the corner the same lady appeared again. She’d obviously come in a complete circle around the quad. This time I smiled properly and asked her if she was lost.

“Emm,” she hesitated. “I’m trying to find someone from the Christian Union… do you know how I would find them?” I was surprised and nodded saying I was actually a member, which seemed quite a fortunate coincidence. She looked relieved and started to explain how her daughter was a student at the university and she wanted us to pray for her. She’d come in especially to ask for us to pray. She told me her daughter’s name and then which course she was on. At which point I took a step back… she was on the same course as me and in my year. The lady reminded me of my own mum, but it wasn’t her very traditional shoes and winter coat, it was something in her face and her eyes that shone out. She was here because her daughter meant so much to her that she had come to find a stranger to pray for her.

I was quite amazed and moved. The next day I related the story to some of my Christian Union friends. I did pray for her daughter, but without much faith that it would do any good. This student was not someone I could really see myself befriending. I’d told my friends she was a lost cause. She was a wild firecracker who rushed in and out of seminars or lectures, wavy blonde hair flying around her, always in a rush. She cracked loud jokes and boasted about boozy nights out and her current boyfriend’s antics… who from what I could gather was some kind of bank robber. Poor lady, no wonder she wanted us to pray! I kept my distance.

Some months later I was choosing modules for the next two years and found myself in a small tutor group with this same girl and three others. We would have to work together in the coming year on a joint video project, which would form a major part our year’s work… I wasn’t looking forward to it. I felt I was the one in need of prayer now. Somehow the two of us always ended up being thrown together against my choice, but over the coming months I began to see another side to this brash confident student. As we lugged heavy video cameras around south London and I struggled to keep up with her striding pace, or we sat munching eggy rolls in the Union snack bar something thawed between us. We became friends.

It was this same girl who a few months later hugged and listened and cried with me in the weeks after my mother’s sudden death. Together we crushed giggling into a phone box in deepest Devon to phone respective boyfriends on a summer camping trip with my recently bereaved father. On graduation day we posed for photographs next to each other outside the Albert Hall and then months later she bundled her essential long black skirt into my bag as I headed for Morocco. On the morning of my wedding we sighed as she helped me into my dress and she teased my dad, in a way only she could get away with. This same girl is married to an inner city vicar and has spent her life building a church and seeing amazing miracles of faith and healing. It seems incredible that my meeting with her mother in a university corridor so many years ago turned out to be the start of something I could never imagine. Was that a coincidence? Or was it an answer to prayer? Whatever you think… thank God for mothers who never give up praying for their children.

my imperfect Bridget Jones

Posted on September 30, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

I’ve had a bit of a love affair with Bridget Jones ever since one night in 2001 when I sat convulsed with laughter near the front of the cinema. Perhaps it was because I didn’t get out a lot due to the difficulty of finding a free night and a babysitter to match, but whatever the reason, I found the film refreshingly funny. It wasn’t just the liberal use of the ‘F’ word and Colin Firth either. It was the heroine. Bridget wasn’t perfect she was hilariously flawed and her obsessions and fears were something I could easily associate with. From her struggles with losing weight and finding a partner to mastering the skills of turning on a microphone, public speaking and riding in a soft top… I’d been there and loved it. The film became a much quoted script that was so versatile, “something to go with anything for any occasion!’ Each time I had to stand up in front of a training session or meeting where there was a speaker system, I was so tempted to tap the mic and shout…”the mic’s not working properly!” On my 40^th birthday, such was my love of the film, that my husband shamed me by hanging out a huge pair of knickers on the fairy lights greeting guests to the surprise bash. Thankfully my time as a local reporter had passed so there was no danger of me doing a Bridget down the pole of my local fire station, even if I did have a bottom the size of Brazil! When Bridget Jones: the Edge of Reason, or Bridget Jones 2 came out it had lost a little of it’s appeal and freshness, so 15 years on, I was intrigued to see how the latest film, Bridget Jones’ Baby would fair.

Instead of watching it with an embarrassed husband disappearing into his seat in a cinema full of women, I went on a girls’ night out with fellow military wives to soak up the new Bridget and all she had to offer. Unfortunately, although it was funny, my dreams were shattered. Bridget and Mark Darcy had changed… what had happened? They had got older, more wrinkled and Oh, I don’t know, it was just all wrong. Suddenly, Bridget’s dizzy moments didn’t seem quite as funny third time around and her muddy face plant at Glastonbury not so endearing. As we left the cinema one of the girls googled Renee Zellweger and Colin Firth’s faces from 2001 and we all sighed with relief… so those were the people we knew, not these strange new faces that had appeared on our screen in episode three. For me the producers had waited too long to make this new film and perhaps we should have let Bridget rest where she was, safe in the arms of Colin Firth in her cardigan and knickers in a snowstorm.

One of the disturbing things about my reaction to an ageing Bridget Jones is the fact that I’m even older than the actress who plays her and yet I still feel pretty much 35. So, is my dislike of the new Bridget a sign of my own uneasiness about growing older and coming to terms with all that goes with it? It was Bridget’s imperfections in the first film that made her so endearing and felt like a breath of fresh air from the perfect heroines in many mainstream films. So, if imperfections are Ok, why not the imperfection of ageing too? Perhaps Bridget Jones Baby is a my wake-up call… I’m not going to be 35 forever, but that’s OK isn’t it?

To camp or not to camp

Posted on August 17, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

Camping is like marmite. You either love it or you hate it. But even if you love it, at some point you’re going to end up hating it.

Despite having dropped plastic boxes caked in grass in the garage, loaded a pile of damp clothes into the washing machine and kicked sleeping bags and airmats into odd corners of the house because I haven’t the energy to put them where they belong, I’m still feeling fairly positive about camping. The last load of washing is drying outside and when we packed up the tent it was bright sunshine, so we don’t have to wait for a windy day to air it on the lawn to stop it growing mold… such is the lot of a seasoned camper.

Last week we headed off for our umpteenth camping trip beside the sea in Devon. What could be more wonderful? Two days before ‘D’ day we decided we couldn’t fit everything in the car plus an extra passenger and would need to order roof bars so that we could take a top box. This wonderful invention allows tall people to store beach things and anything sandy high up out of reach where they will never be seen again, until you come to unpack at the end of the holiday and discover that’s where the badminton rackets, beach ball, windbreak and umbrella were after all. The roof bars arrived and were carefully assembled, but unfortunately didn’t fit the connection with the roof box. Problem one. No time to order new bars, so alternative bars had to be purchased locally, which also didn’t fit. Problem two. Third time lucky the bars were exchanged, fitted and the box was on top and the car was ready to be packed. Another problem was the fridge. Problem three. Tents don’t have fridges unlike their superior caravan cousins. So cool boxes/bags had to be bought (and returned due to unsuitability)… We began to wonder – is it really worth it? Why are we going camping? What about air B&B?

7 reasons I love camping:

No housework
Minimal cooking – due to limited pans and burners
Waking up to blue skies
Sitting out under the stars drinking… wine mostly
The perfect view from the tent of a curving sandy bay and rolling waves, with an island in the distance
Smelling fresh grass and BBQs 24/7
Not feeling guilty about fried egg and bacon for breakfast

5 reasons not to go camping:

The possibility it may rain
The long walk to the toilets in the middle of the night – or stinging yourself on nettles seeking alternative loo point by the hedge
The beds – there aren’t any
The cool box, that isn’t, and smells of cheese after 24 hours
Filling the water bottle, carrying it up the hill back to the tent and then realizing you needed to go to the toilet
Oh and also… leaving the Fairy Liquid beside the communal sink – returning half an hour later to find a half used Co-op bottle in its place!

On balance, I think camping is a good thing. Our children love it. We endure it and I expect we’ll be back again next year… after all there are 7 good reasons to go. And I forgot to mention the sunsets!

Letting yourself go

Posted on August 4, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

Do you ever let yourself go? I don’t mean not washing your hair and wearing old clothes, but really ‘letting go’. I’m not precisely sure what this kind of ‘letting go’ looks like, but I know I’ve been on the edge of it and I’ve certainly had dreams about it…

I did a parachute jump quite a few years ago. It was BC*. I’d spent a whole weekend sitting in a classroom, then practising jumping, landing and rolling off a little platform a few feet up. We were all ready to go by mid afternoon on the Saturday… but the weather wasn’t. Apparently it was too windy. There was a chance it would be too windy the next day too and as our ‘training’ only lasted a few days, if we didn’t make the jump soon we’d have to train all over again. It does actually make sense. Practising to jump from a great height is a good idea, so that when it comes to taking that leap of faith you do it almost automatically. There’s a drill you know and the drill will make you safe.

During the early hours of Sunday morning the person I still share a bed with was woken with me shouting, “One thousand, two thousand… check parachute!” with most of the duvet pulled over my head. I thought I was ready!

The wind was still a touch too strong the next morning and us would-be parachutists lazed around in the sunshine, looking up at a blue, blue sky and intermittently watching a wind sock. This isn’t a sock hanging in the wind on the edge of the runway– it’s more of a traffic cone made from kite material that fills with wind and flutters or flops. We were hoping for more of a flop as the day progressed. The wind was a problem for parachutists because it could easily blow us off course and we could end up in the river Trent or a up a tree or in a silage tank… yuk! ..rather than the intended cornfield.

Eventually we were called to order and told we were going up in a plane that we wouldn’t be landing in. The little practise jumps and rolls were repeated and hugging our black parachute packs to our chest we walked towards the runway. I remember glancing back and waving and hoping everything was going to work out OK. There were a number of possible scenarios.
1. The parachute didn’t open
2. The parachute tangled
3. I broke my leg on landing or worse
4. The emergency chute failed or I forgot where the pull thing was (where is it again?)

Hopefully the person who had packed my parachute had done a good job and all would be well. But I said a little prayer anyway. A parachutist had died a week earlier at the same airfield when both his parachutes had failed, but statistically didn’t this make my chances of survival better?

It was amazing looking out of the door of the plane and inching myself along with my feet dangling over the edge of the sky. A guy in goggles gave me the thumbs up and I really had nowhere else to go except out. I let go of the handle I was gripping with one hand and leapt. A few seconds later I was looking up at a perfectly circular canopy above me and had that beautiful experience of floating to earth like a spaceman/woman. The landing was a little bumpier than expected… but all in all it had worked. I lived to tell the tale and write up the story in the local newspaper.

Somehow jumping out of a plane was easier than some of the other leaps I’ve been called on to take in life. But experience is telling me taking a risk, doing something that doesn’t make complete sense, is more fulfilling than watching from the safety of the ground. So… what leaps are you taking today?

*Before Children

The end of a hot day

Posted on July 19, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

Today’s hot weather made me dream of being back in Cyprus. It was after a day of slightly higher temperatures than this that we picked up an unexpected stowaway in our hire car…

During a visit back to the island last month, we’d decided to pop out for an ice cream and an evening stroll down the beach. A couple of miles en-route there was, unusually for Cyprus, a queue of traffic caused by a Cypriot wedding, as guests dropped cars on the corners of pavements and stopped unexpectedly to let out glamorous ladies in high heels. I could hear the sound of a cat crying and it seemed very close by. I looked around to see where it was, then as we continued we both noticed the noise was still with us. I even turned to check in the back seat. As the sound grew more distinct and insistent we had the awful thought that the cat could be injured somewhere under the car or shut in the boot, so we quickly pulled into the nearest hotel entrance and jumped out. The mournful crying hadn’t stopped and unbelievably it seemed to be coming from under the bonnet.

A couple of Russian tourists wandered over to see what was wrong and could also hear the crying. The bonnet was popped and we all peered into the engine… no sign of a cat. But the plaintive meow continued. I was worried the animal was trapped and injured. One of the Russians suggested we turn the wheel slowly because that’s where the sound seemed to be coming from. Seconds later he leaned into the back of the engine and lifted out a tiny black and tortoiseshell kitten. Amazingly it seemed fine and was still desperately crying. He handed the kitten over and said, “Here you go – it’s yours!” Neither of us could believe this tiny kitten had survived the drive a mile a two down the road and lived to tell the tale.

We were very relieved that it was uninjured and decided to return to the flat where we assumed it had crawled into the car. The kitten buried itself in my neck and even started purring. We bought kitten food en-route (we are softies at heart) in case it was hungry and to help with the shock of being in an engine. We hoped it would wander off and find its mother somewhere in the surrounding bushes where many stray cats seemed to be living. So with the Kitten left eating, we headed out for that ice cream…

The next morning we checked the car for any sounds incase the little chap had returned. There was no sound from the car, but wait a minute… there was a familiar cry and it was coming from a car behind us. This time we couldn’t open the bonnet and didn’t even know who owned the vehicle. Eventually after practically lying under the car the same kitten, with a dangerous passion for car engines, was coaxed out from the engine through the wheel arch. This time a local lady was on hand to carry it off to safety, away from the temptation of parked cars.

That old advert for Esso petrol sprung to mind, urging drivers to ‘put a tiger in your tank’, with the photo of a roaring tiger. We’d had a baby tiger in our engine but his roar had been more of a meow.

Trains: laugh or cry?

Posted on June 11, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

I stumbled into a ‘commuter sit com’ yesterday… the cast included tubes, trains, buses and a woman without a shoe. I had to laugh or I’d have cried.

It was a sultry afternoon in the big smoke and I’d planned to leave an hour or two earlier, but found myself juggling and then dropping luggage en route to the tube. This included a pulley case, a large handbag that wanted to slide off my shoulder and a 6ft poster partly encased in a cardboard tube. I was pleased to bump into a colleague also off to the station and as we stood on the platform we discussed tube routes and places to live and work in London. The platform was filling up and after we’d been chatting over an announcement, we were puzzled to see everyone leaving both platforms and heading back up the stairs to the entrance. What else could we do but follow? There were no underground staff in sight to give advice or point in the direction of helpful buses. Luckily my colleague knew the bus routes and we strolled for half an hour through beeping traffic and people-lined streets. The poster was getting shirty and as I tried to slide it back under my arm the white lid at the bottom popped off and rolled along the pavement. As my colleague skipped towards it, we both sighed as it toppled into a deep brown puddle and disappeared from sight.
“It’s OK no problem,” I said, thinking, “Crap, crap and double crap,” or words to that effect, as the poster slid through the tube again and I hoisted it up against my shoulder. When we eventually arrived at the bus stop for number 18, there were no buses in sight and the iphone showed three or four all bunched up some miles away. We sweltered on the pavement as successive buses with eights in came and went. Number 228, number 28, more 228s – no number 18. Eventually it arrived and sitting on the back seat with my poster safely stored and carry on case at my feet we were making good progress. All I had to do was watch the electronic ticker screen for the right stop for Baker Street… meanwhile we were moving again, so all was good.

About 10 minutes later, as we gazed at the screen instead of the next stop the words ‘terminating’ flashed up and seconds later the bus had pulled in at some traffic lights and the driver said everyone would have to get out and catch one of the posse of buses behind. I secretly reckoned he needed a loo stop. We sighed and back out in the sunshine there were no buses in view, but there was a tube station just across the road. Having worked out which line to pick up to get to Victoria we found ourselves in a huge crowd pressed together waiting for a lift to the platform. More tube, case and bag manoeuvres followed as I knocked a few grumpy commuters on the head with the poster and also tried not to drop the bankcard I was using as a ticket.

After letting one tube go because there was no way my poster, bags and I were fitting into the sardine tin that was masquerading as a carriage, we eventually squeezed into a slightly less packed train and a few stops and changes later I was filtering towards the way out. The route to the escalator was packed with people moving at a snails pace and the mainline station was the same. All my trains south had ‘delayed’ next to them and I found myself very hot and waiting with a throng of other frustrated would-be passengers for news of two possible trains without a platform number. When it eventually flashed up half an hour later I trudged towards the snake of coaches and started counting carriages to avoid the first four, which were heading to Bognor.

I found a seat and settled down, but still wasn’t sure if I was in the correct part of the train. I wasn’t. It was that kind of journey. Before it set off I trundled bags and poster down the length of the train to carriage number 4 of 12, which involved a lot more collisions with other people’s bags and heads and arms and legs that were blocking my route, scattering sorrys as I went.

Thankfully I secured a seat and we were off. It was a direct train to Emsworth… well that’s what I thought. Surely it couldn’t be as bad as the journey the day before when I’d arrived at the station to find my train had been cancelled? I had to change twice, only just getting to my meeting on time.

A few stations on there was a commotion behind me next to the doors as someone screamed, “My shoe, my shoe! I’ve lost my shoe – it’s fallen down between the train!” People were looking concerned and hoping no-one was going to try and be heroic and reach down to fetch it. There were no rail staff in sight and the wailing and worrying continued from the distressed passenger. Her friends were shouting out for someone to help, until one piped up. “You’ve got more shoes in your bag haven’t you?”
“Yes,” she said, “Of course I have more shoes, but I want my shoe, I’ve got a flip and I can’t flop now!”

The doors closed and we were moving. A lone flip-flop was abandoned on the tracks below. The ‘one-shoe’ woman’s party of 40 somethings were Bognor-bound and continued to discuss the missing shoe loudly. They then realised they were in the wrong part of the train. What followed could only happen on an English train. The five or six women, carrying clanking bottles of booze, cases and a blackboard of instructions, including ‘take off your bra’ and ‘sing a line from Queen’, pushed and shouted their way down the corridor of hot standing commuters. An elderly lady with a stick opposite looked astounded at the conversations and another one at the table put her head in her hands as the shouting for people to move out of the way and questions over whose luggage was blocking the corridor echoed round the carriage. Eventually the carriage doors closed and their piercing voices faded to a muffled clamour. “Lock that door,” snapped a man with a closely cropped beard sitting on a single seat. Everyone giggled. Then the singing started and the automatic doors occasionally opened to treat everyone to a full volume rendition of, ‘Like a virgin,’ and other memorable tunes.

I put in my earphones and began to enjoy the view of passing fields and hedges. Everyone in the carriage agreed that when the train divided we’d all be happily waving farewell to our band of women heading for that 40^th birthday bash in Bognor. Lucky old Bognor. Unfortunately it wasn’t to be. The allotted station came and a guard slammed doors and turned keys assertively. We expected to be shunting off soon. Then the dreaded announcement…“This train won’t be dividing now due to staff shortages… wait for further notices.” Everyone was phoning friends and family to tell them of further delays to the already delayed train.

Some time later I was standing on a platform again – poster, wheelie case and now an apple core in my hand. It was nearly 8pm and I’d left the office just before 4pm… the journey had turned into a marathon. Two men beside me talked about their attempt to catch a train at 3.30pm from London. “My wife’s driving over to pick me up, do you want a lift to Chichester?” They disappeared down the steps from the platform and I looked after them dismally, wishing for a car. There was confusion amidst the crowds on the platform, but no one was panicking. We’re British. We cope and grin and bear it. But this was Friday night and everyone just wanted to be home. How we all loved English trains at this point and Southern Rail in particular. It wasn’t too long before another train slid in beside the waiting crowd on the platform and my wheelie case, poster and bag (minus apple core which had joined the breeding ground of missing shoes on the tracks below) were safely transported to Emsworth. It was the end of a very long journey. Luckily fish ‘n’ chips were waiting… Laugh or cry – you choose…

Scars with a story

Posted on May 11, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

I am scarred, bruised and a little bit achy today. It’s been caused by a combination of activities on boats and bikes, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Were you one of those children whose knees were always bleeding or scabbed? I was. I also remember standing by the sink on numerous occasions and that awful sting when someone tries to dab them with a paper towel. Most people grow out of this. But my legs and arms chart a tale of adventures over the years, which have included a long white scar on my arm from being caught on the anchor chain of a yacht, an angry red mark on my shin from a mini cycling accident and more recently another deep scar on the other shin from tripping on ancient stone steps in Cyprus.

There have been a lot of these kinds of incidents over the years. The most memorable or dramatic from my childhood was on a cycling expedition in Kent with my brother and some friends. We were hurtling down narrow winding lanes, screaming with excitement, when suddenly a Tjunction appeared in front of us and my breaks failed to stop me. I flew off the bike and wound up with my chin impaled on a barbed wire fence and quite a lot of blood around. After being lifted off the fence, dusted down and told to ‘man-up’, I cycled slowly home and went to find my mother at the bottom of the garden. She was doing something with vegetables and I was looking for sympathy and shock. I told her the dramatic tale. She chuckled, barely glanced at my rapidly healing chin, and said it didn’t look too bad. This must be where I get my sympathetic maternal approach.

Last weekend I tested out my sailing skills in a little dinghy, which turned out to be great fun but very slippery. After sliding around in the bottom of the boat as I tried to tack the bruises were accumulating and then on a rather unplanned speedy arrival at the shore I tried to jump out neatly and grab the boat before it hit the side. After slipping on the mud and rocks as I slid out and spectacularly failing to stop the boat, I found both my knees were bleeding when I stumbled ashore.

Yesterday two of us cycled round the path on the edge of the island. It was bumpy and very narrow at places – there was even a section a bit like a velodrome where we had to cycle fast to stay upright on a concrete bank which sloped away to the water. I thought like an Olympian, looked straight ahead and kept peddling fast. I hadn’t fallen off for several miles until we reached a gate by a marina where we had to push the bikes for a few metres. After inspecting the boats for sale I got back on as the gravel path widened and within a few seconds the wheels skidded from beneath me and I was lying on the ground with the bike on top of me. My cycle buddy was standing a few feet away holding his bike and laughing. “I saw the gravel and decided to get off,” he said… More matching scars and scrapes on my shins to join the bruises and scabs on my knees.

Now what shall I do today to make my arms blend in… mowing the lawn or cutting trees?

Sink or swim?

Posted on April 23, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

Today feels like I’m coming up for air after a long stretch underwater. It’s surprising how a crisis can throw everything else you’ve been worrying about into a vague blur. A bit like swimming under water, you can see the bottom of the pool and random arms and legs of other swimmers bubble past without much meaning. All you can hear is the sound of your own breathing. It’s a whole other world.

I went swimming in a pool for the first time in months this week and was happy that I hadn’t forgotten how to do front crawl. Amazingly it even felt quite natural and I didn’t arrive at the end of the pool desperate for air. I was still a lot slower than my current swim buddy – who is significantly younger. Ploughing up and down the pool gave me time to reflect on the last couple of weeks and the sound of my own breath in and out reminded me of sitting beside a hospital bed and watching my son breathe. He had to think about breathing, something most of us rarely do. At points he was using his whole body to help him draw in air. It was painful to watch.

This particular family crisis is over for now. I’m no longer lying awake in bed wondering if my son will make it through the night and praying for him to have the strength to go on breathing. I can look back with a grateful heart, that the tears and the fears – spoken and unspoken – are now consigned to a flashback or occasional nightmare. And I’m a believer in the power of prayer. The prayers and support of so many friends and family were a comfort for our family as we found ourselves in a very dark and scary place for a few days.

My perspective on life earlier this month felt a bit like swimming under water and coming up for air. Now I’m wondering if it’s the other way round. Do I live my life underwater, looking at the world through misty goggles, when I should be getting my head above water? Facing issues of life and death puts things into sharp focus – issues that were a worry become insignificant compared with the reality that is this moment.

I’ve heard someone say we should make each day count because we never know what the next day will bring. Perhaps it’s time for a change in perspective. Time to embark on that adventure we’ve talked about, but never actually set off on… time to make the most of every moment of every day.

I want to breathe it all in because it’s God that gives me breath and that breath is life.

scavenger season

Posted on March 31, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

We’re all scavengers at heart. Who doesn’t like picking something up for nothing and making use of it? I love it, as do other members of the family. And what better place to do a bit of scavenging, than on the beach?

Since we moved here the shoreline around the island has been an endless source of treasures and surprises all rolled into one. If you like collecting driftwood, shells, pebbles and odd bits of this and that blown in by the tide, you’d love it here too.

This weekend there was some major scavenging to be done. It was almost a salvage job, but I’ll come back to that. Let’s call it ‘Op Groin’ or ‘Operation Groin’ for non-military types. The start of the operation was some weeks back on another beach where an interesting piece of wood was spotted protruding from the wet sand as the sea retreated into the distance. Sunday afternoon dog walkers passed by without a glance, until someone began digging and digging and digging… without a spade too! Some time later, along time later actually, a giant oak groin/beam was uncovered and claimed by the digger. Determined not to loose his booty he hauled it across the beach into the dunes and buried it. This short sentence does not accurately describe the Herculean effort it took or the toll on clothes and hands and patience, by those of us who advised against it. Once in the dunes, photos were taken of the ‘secret’ location so Pirate-like he could return to collect it another day. End of the first part of Op Groin.

Several weeks passed. Christmas came and went before Op Groin went into full swing again. More troops were recruited to help with the next sortie. There was some doubt about whether the buried treasure could be found, but ‘sniffer-dog-like’, the damp wood buried in the dunes was uncovered again and four healthy volunteers shouldered the weight and carried it down the beach, along the footpath and back to the recovery vehicle on the road. Success is a six foot beam drying in the garage.

But it wasn’t all over. This beam needed other similar pieces to be really useful. Fortunately, two more likely items were spotted quite recently nearby, so this weekend Op Groin Part 2 swung into play. The battered wood was spotted quite quickly this time, not buried, just lying on the rocks. And while the storm clouds brewed overhead, I helped manhandle the pieces into the vehicle, at the same time as rescuing an old football and some interesting pebbles, before we piled into the car as the heavens opened. Two more immense beams are now drying in another outside store. Thank goodness that’s over!

Today on a cycle along the beach keen eyes spotted a mast leaning at an odd angle from the shore. We headed over, careless of brambles and mud, wondering what a large boat could be doing so close in. It was a sorry sight. A large, rather lovely yacht was marooned on the beach, lying on its side, all out of sorts its hull imbedded in the sand. We later discovered that this yacht was swept ashore just a few hours after Op Groin had ended. Now, that would have been a very big salvage operation. Fortunately for the owners our prime family scavenger had returned to London by the time the boat appeared. No one’s too clear about the law of salvage, so we left the boat safely in the hands of a couple of frolicking seals.

As for Op Groin, thankfully the operation didn’t leave any casualties, apart from sore shoulders, and one day the wood drying in the garage may be turned into a beautiful table or a bench or even a bed… we can but hope.

that sinking feeling

Posted on March 15, 2016 by Rachel Farmer-Reay

Devon has been seeping into my soul this week. Its hazy afternoon horizons, skeletons of trees lining hilltops and rocky coves where cliff outcrops rise out of ice blue water have been reeling me in. I’ve watched the tide licking its way up estuaries and curling its tongue around bobbing boats and buoys. The painfully narrow lanes have become less threatening, switch backing through rolling hills, as cars and buses breathe in and kiss wing mirrors to squeeze past. Pretty painted houses line the sides of steep estuary banks like stacked dominoes staring down at themselves in silver water snaking through the valleys. This land of white washed cottages, beam-laden pubs with log fires, sailing boats and fishermen is pulsating with stories and intrigue.

A few days ago, lunch and water carefully packed, we set off along one of these mesmerizing estuaries as the tide ebbed out. When we reached the sea an ancient smugglers’ pub provided liquid refreshment on a rocky island just offshore, reached only at low tide. I checked out the barman for eye patches and parrots – the tell tale sign of a pirate or a smuggler. He seemed fairly law abiding and even provided free blue plasters for customers with sore feet – a bit soft for a smuggler perhaps. As we’d diligently followed a footpath across fields on the first leg of the journey, we decided to make up our own route on the way back and follow the curving river inland. How hard could it be with the tide out?

Gradually rock and sand gave way to mud and fallen trees. OK so far. The banks began to turn steep and the mud became stickier. “Stay close to the rock,” was the instruction passed back – apparently this mud was less ‘sinky’. Some time later we had gone a long way, too far to turn back if the mud became impassable. There were fallen trees to clamber over and it became a case of picking a route on solid ground wherever possible. Curves in the river threw up new challenges as we had to navigate streams and more sinking sand and mud. So far we’d made it and surely it couldn’t be much further? A particularly substantial barrier of fallen trees and undergrowth blocked our path and although we tried to follow a line of firm-looking sand, we soon began to sink and had to head back to the bank and battle through the trees to make progress. By now we were convinced we had passed the worst of the sinking mud, so we crossed a narrow stream onto a line of solid sand, striding confidently onwards. Gradually I noticed the stream between us and the bank was widening and the sandbank felt more like the middle of the river. It was time to cross back to the safety of the bank because the tide had now turned and gullies of water were filling up. I had visions of being up to my knees in mud waiting for the air sea rescue helicopter. But before I knew it I was on my own and the lead member of the party was safe on the stones at the edge, urging me to run and not stop until I reached solid ground. I took a deep breath and began running, pulling my boots and legs out of the squelching mud threatening to suck me down. Obviously, I made it. Just. Mud up to the knees of my lovely blue jeans and coating my walking boots, seemed a small price to pay for the walk up the river and along the tidal road… but never again. I won’t be trusting Devon’s river estuaries, which look like sand, but turn into sinking mud.

I realized it was a very near miss, when a few days later we witnessed a full RNLI rescue of a dog up to its neck in the mud on the edge of another estuary. When he was eventually carried out exhausted and mud drenched by several firemen and RNLI rescue crew everyone breathed a sigh of relief and I thought… it could have been me!

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