The Oxford Canal beat the Danube and the Styx to be awarded the world-famous City Barge Autumn Tour for the 2025 season.
After hours of meticulous planning, the tour was almost derailed by a last-minute participant, Storm Benjamin, but due to a stroke of planning genius, the unwelcome gate-crasher was thwarted by starting a day early on Wednesday, 22nd October.
Perfect weather, Venetian guests, four Venetian sandolos on the Thames and generous participation by City Barge members made for a truly unforgettable event.
And what a banger it was! Our pre-dawn arrival at the boathouse to set up breakfast and ready the boats saw the sunrise poised to be perfect for the oncoming celebrations; it certainly didn’t disappoint!
This trip is advertised as ”training for the Vogalonga”, but some of us are now too ancient to actually consider the 32 km non-competitive rowing marathon. I cannot believe that this holiday gets better every year, as the rowing is always accompanied by parties and prosecco.
The sun was shining the temperature was 12° C—perfect for the first row of the year!
In July Henley Royal Regatta was in progress involving about 660 competing crews, many from abroad.