Happy Birthday, Ma'am; alternator good, list bad

In honour of HM The Queen's 90th birthday today I put out the bunting on Jubilee.

Jan took this one

The bunting's a bit pathetic, really, but we made the effort. It's hardly noticeable from the back as we make our way to Market Harborough again, this time with Ally and Josiah on board.

What is it with this part of Leicestershire and interesting old cars? Walking back to the boat after shopping in Market Harborough this afternoon we came upon this lovely Riley sports car.

It was parked on its own on an unloved expanse of tarmac and concrete between a tool hire place and a bodywork shop.

On the way back to Foxton to drop Ally and Josiah back at their car - they'd come to visit for the day - I spotted this bird of prey above the really smelly factory (animal products?).

Considering I was steering and there was a bend coming up I was pleased to get this shot. I think the forked tail identifies it as a red kite. Not that you can see any colour in my silhouette photo.

Just before our visitors left I took this photo of proud Granny holding a contented Josiah.

Alternator update: Part of the reason for our there-and-back-in-a-day trip to Market Harborough was to give the reconfigured charging system a good run. I am very pleased to report that it all seems to work just fine. My ammeter hit the end stop (but only just) when I started the engine this morning, meaning that at least 110A were going into the domestic batteries. They won't know what's hit them! The charge rate quickly dropped to about 80A, then reduced, eventually to 10A, as the batteries charged. As another good sign that things were working as they should, when we put the electric toaster on (800W) with the engine on tickover (boat tied up), the engine note dropped and the current went up to 80A. Pretty much exactly what one would expect.

Listing update: Jubilee had developed a list to port when we had the water pump issue. I thought the list had gone when we pumped out the water from the cabin bilge, but now it seems to have returned. There appears to be slightly more water visible through the inspection hatch, but the water pump and surroundings are dry. Perhaps I merely need to reballast the boat to take account of the to bikes which are now on the port side. (But we're carrying about the same weight as in previous years, on the same side, and had no listing problems then. A mystery.)