Celebrity Row's Blog

19/07/10 20:00

celebrityrow — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:03:45 +0000

20:00 19/07/10 Its been 48 hours since the RNLI towed us into Grimsby for the last time. Some of us have been to work and some have had a day with their families…but I am sure we have all reflected upon the last 3 weeks of adventure. We’ve had so many highs and so few lows. I am overwhelmed by the calls of support and congratulations that I have had over the last 24 hours…maybe it has put into perspective that the challenge has ended as a huge achievement – not in disappointment as we have all felt. Of course, we would have loved to do the final leg….but you can not fight adverse weather conditions in the North Sea with a mere row boat….even if that row boat is Oyster Shack! The weather would still be against us today with the northerly winds blowing us south making passage out and away from the Humber impossible. The Coastguard warned us that this weather front has now settled in for the foreseeable future….so we realise we had no alternative but to finish.

I have posted some more photos onto the website of our record breaking row and hope these can illustrate the fun and success we have had during the 3 weeks. Always after an adventure like this there are the highs and lows, the euphoria and the disappointments. From my point of view these are some of my highlights:

Highs: The dolphins joining us off the Cornwall coast….just a privilege to have seen that at a time (4am!!) that I needed a lift! Simon Chaulk meeting us at Ilfracombe…absolutely amazed at the speed at which we had rowed from Lands End breaking the existing record in recording 120 miles in just 31 hours!! The Minehead pub; talking and understanding the sacrifices that the volunteers of the RNLI make. Strange one…as I’m not a townie!!…but the protection of parents in nature…the timeless occasions that we saw ducks protect their ducklings or swans defend their signets as our oars came close to their families. Ben Kay cracking open the locks at Foxton…and the one that I am sure that I pushed open before the British Lion and England 2nd row forward!! The Foxton record tumbling. The cheer that we heard whilst rowing up the Soar to Colourworks with the horns blowing and family and friends running alongside the boat. The sight of the Humber Bridge…at that time believing we could make it to Hull before tide turned. Getting out the Humber estuary….before being sucked back in!!

Lows. Getting stuck in the tide after Ilfracombe and rowing for 6 hours covering less than 6 miles!! The pains and aches all over the body after 2 days….although these subsided the longer the rowing continued. Technology…..my iPhone will be claimed by the kids tomorrow as its signal failed time after time when other phones seemed to work well!! The tracker failing from Leicester to Hull was such bad timing for family and friends following us. Calling out the RNLI after we’d been sucked back into the Humber estaury with the realisation that our adventure was coming to a premature end and then mooring up Oyster Shack for the last occasion.

So the adventure has ended and my thanks go to a fantastic crew that I really enjoyed rowing with and have built up lifetime friendships with… Paul Williams – never stopped rowing – just rowed and rowed and rowed! Ian – for all the treats he continually managed to hide in the boats and come out with when we were low. Kiwi – for his power in the stroke and literally being a one man rowing engine! Andy – for all the last minute organisation as the Lumbers panic management was in danger of collapse!! Paul – just to watch the experinced gig rower in action and trying to keep us in check on the river sections (sometimes!!) Simon Cooper – for his rowing contribution and all the organisation of hotels and so much more.

Also our thanks to everyone who has contributed….our land team of Alan and my brother J…….Mark and Annette who delivered and collected the gig…….Chloe at PWC for getting so many freebies……Sarah, Sara, Anna and David who coxed……..accomodation with Liz at Staverton and Steve & Alison at Hoverington……celebs Ben Kay for his 2 days rowing and his blogs!!!……Willie Thorne, Andy Abrahams, Steve Hodge, Andrew Castle……..the Bishop of Leicester for blessing Tiger!

Importantly, thanks to our sponsors: Mattioli Woods, Price Waterhouse Coopers and Lumbers. Chris Sturgess at Sturgess Land Rover for the hugely generous loan of the 2 cars…I want a Discovery – it is an absolutely fantastic car! Breilting for making the limited edition Emergency watches (still 1 available at Lumbers!!). To Stewart, Dave, Mark and all at Virtual Viewing for their patience in creating a fantastic website, which got changed more than once!!!

The most important thanks though is to Simon Chaulk at Woodvale Challenge who lent us both boats and coordinated the trip. Along with Ian Couch and Lee Fudge the route was fantastic and the planning perfect. Good luck for the Round Britain Race….maybe Lumbers should sponsor??!!! And of course my gratitude goes to all of you who have read my blogs, followed our adventure and donated generously to our charities.

All the best Dom

18/07/10 08:00

celebrityrow — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 11:05:22 +0000

It seems our exciting adventure is over with another call to the Humber emergency services! This time we come under the auspice of the RNLI as we are officially in the North Sea rather than our earlier rescue by the Humber Rescue!

We were going so well….the estuary was behind us and, although sea conditions were choppy, we were back into the cycle of shifts!We’d been having problems steering Oyster Shack as the tide was too strong for rhe foot pedal steering! The front cabin crew had to take it in turns to hang out the front hatch and manually direct the rudder. As we began to contemplate the long night shifts we could easily feel the swirling, changing wind direction and the impact this, along with the changing tide, was having on our progress. Speed had dropped from 6 knots to under 1 knot when we changed shifts at 6pm.

The ‘A’ team were back in rowing positions, as they had been for the 1st rescue! Forward progress was now impossible – speed had increased but we were now in 2nd reverse gear and the speed was backwards!! The Humber was sucking us back into it’s hazardous waters and the wind was now helping it by blowing us in that direction too! On this occasion there was no rescue services CCTV monitoring our position and it became apparent to us that we were soon to be ferry fodder as we drifted into the busy shipping lanes servicing the many ports.

The Humber RNLI based at Spurn Head is the only full time crew in the UK – indicating the severity of the sea in this area. The advice was simple – although we were keen to continue they needed to tow us before we disappeared under the hull of a tanker or ferry! ‘The Pride of the Humber’ manned by it’s 6 crew took us alongside and we clambered aboard to safetly from the swirling seas. Again many thanks to the boys of the emergency services!

The wind is now against us making the final leg impossible. Our epic journey draws to a close with some miraculous achievements.

We are the first to row from coast to coast, Bristol to Grimsby.

We set a rowing record for the 120 miles from Lands End to Ilfracombe in under 31 hours.

Foxton Locks, the largest staircase of locks in the country, saw us with Ben Kay smash it’s record from 29 minutes to only 20 minutes and 40 seconds.

We have rowed close to 600 miles over 3 weeks enjoying experiences with so many people.

We have so many thanks to make that we shall come to those later….but in summary by Kiwi. ‘it’s not the destination that matters but the journey that you make to get there!’

17/07/10 21:30

celebrityrow — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 20:31:23 +0000

17/07/10 21:30 Alas, had to be rescued again… In the shipping lanes and going nowhere fast, in fact we were going backwards. A call to the good men of the RNLI, and our adventure is now on hold while we regroup. Will know more in the morning, after a crew conflab. Now off to buy the next round of drinks for our rescuers. Three cheers for the RNLI!! and a huge Thank You once again.

17/07/10 15:00

celebrityrow — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 18:20:12 +0000

15:00 17/07/10 We’re in the North Sea!! No comments or jokes please to our families about ‘The Deadly North Sea’ till we’re back on dry ground! The marina control tower suddenly released us between 2 Clippers coming in and allowed us to take advantage of high tide. We had left port by 11:30 and been averaging speeds of 6 knots. It’s allowed us to row past Grimsby and out of the estuary! The last leg really feels started as driving winds have blown waves over the boat giving a wet start to the shift. The plan is to row to Bridlington….some 60 miles or, if we’ve really got a steam on, we’ll pass Bridlington and continue to the next stop of Scarborough. Either way we’ll not be stopping till tomorrow afternoon. I doubt I’ll get signal for another blog till then….but hopefully the new GPS tracker is working and you can monitor our position!

17/07/10 10:50

celebrityrow — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 11:24:23 +0000

10:50 17/07/10 It’s a fun but frustrating start to the day. The weather is perfect – blustery winds from the South that will assist our north progress. We were told that we would be able to leave Hull before 11, we were ready by 9:30 but the Clipper race organisers have imposed a no go area right outside the marina until the last boat arrives!! So we are stuck at the harbour entrance! But it’s a great event to watch…these guys and gals have travelled 35,000 miles over 10 months…makes our 3 weeks seem feeble! We’ve had the paras exhibition sky diving team and we’re about to enjoy the saxophonist from Britain’s got Talent, Jules! He’s actually performed twice in Lumbers…so we may get a mention!! Gary and I have been up on the big stage interviewed by the BBC about our exploits – all publicity helps! Which brings us to the headline article in the Leicester Mercury about our rescue on the Humber…great article….fab..although I think some of the team don’t want to advertise our failings!

Today’s plan is now having to be recalculated! Fortunately, we all listen to Paul Williams and won’t make the same mistake twice. We probably won’t be able to leave until 1pm…so will have missed 2 hours of tide. This will probably prevent us getting out the estuary today…so it may be fish and chips in Grimsby tonight! Technology is back working! Hopefully the GPS tracker will now follow us to the end. This iPhone is getting signal today…let’s not look too far ahead for when that fails though!!

16/07/10 13:00

celebrityrow — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 16:03:47 +0000

13:00 16/07/10 It seems strange to be back in the office, albeit for a short stint!! Seeing the Leicester Mercury billboards exclaiming our rescue has caused quite a sense of humour in the shop…..but does make you realise how dangerous the next leg will be! We left Paul Williams in Hull monitoring the weather and watching the Clipper boats come into a festival at Hull. The wind is really gusting today and we were right in making the decision to be grounded for 48 hours. Currently off shore and in the North Sea 40 mph winds are blowing Northbound…..of course these would speed up the boat and make a fast trip to John O’Groats but safety is of paramount importance. We are hoping that winds will be below 20 mph tomorrow for when we set off with high tide at 11am.

On reflection we are indebted to the Humber Rescue and must reinforce our gratitude. They are volunteers and seem to spend a lot of their time searching for bodies as 2 people jump from the Humber Bridge per week. Reading their website www.humber-rescue.org.uk certainly explains the treacherous nature of the Humber and the inadequacy of our back up plans on Wednesday. At least they were impressed by our Breitling Emergency watches….these are perfect for the next phase! Breitling very kindly agreed to make a limited edition run of their world famous SOS signalling watch which can pin point us to within 1 metre in an emergency! Making a numbered run of only 10 is a world first…..its the smallest production run ever by Breitling and the first time they have allowed this watch to endorse anything other than for aviation purposes. Lumbers in Leicester have only a couple left for retail sale – and a percentage of the funds are going direct to the charities. Lets hope we don’t need to rely on them – but at least we feel safer with them on our wrists!!

My brother J is very kindly giving us his time again tomorrow to drive the crew back upto Hull. The new GPS has arrived and we’ll reset it in the morning – so hopefully you’ll be able to follow us live over the next few days. The 48 hour break may have done us good and got us ready for the final endurance session. It is still possible to get up to John O’Groats within our time window…..but we’ll need some good fortune and some good wind heading in our direction!!

More pictures from the last few days

celebrityrow — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 09:11:35 +0000

While we brace ourselves for our second assault on the final leg of the adventure, we thought we’d take a moment to share a few more our of photos from the journey so far.

Ben Kay enjoying a moment in the sunshine with his children
while we negotiate a lock

Ian Mattoli coxing with Paul Bassett looking backwards and
Sarah Wilkins, Lumbers Valuer, and (if only for short while)
the only woman to row

And here’s Sarah in action with the oars, with
(from front to back) Paul , Simon, Andy and Kiwi

And a shot of the Lumbers crew, taken at Colourworks
in Leicester at the half-way party.
From left to right: Raj, Dominic, Kim and Freddie, Del, Michelle, Jenni,
Kiwi (Gary), Lyn, Simon, Maddie, Sarah, Susan and Paul

15/07/10 13:00

celebrityrow — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 15:04:08 +0000

13:00 15/07/10 The weather has closed in and all local sailors are warning there are perils on the Humber! The swell looks huge and the driving winds would make further progress impossible. Even the local wind turbines have been stopped due to the severe gusting winds!! We’ve had discussions all morning…alot of them very repetitive but at last we have come to a unanimous decision…there can be no rowing for 48 hours! It does seem amazing that this decision has taken hours to get to when the coast guards told us last night that we wouldn’t be going anywhere for a couple of days! So where does this leave us?? Even though, upon reflection, we realise that our bad decision making and management caused our problems yesterday, we’re still in good spirits and want to continue the row. Time may not allow us to complete the journey to John O’Groats, but we want to still try and get as far as possible. We’re heading home for a 48 hour break during these impossible weather conditions, then back to Hull on Saturday to finish the adventure next week…..with a new GPS!!

The Kiwi Connection II

celebrityrow — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 13:23:46 +0000

You might have noticed a post here, The Kiwi Connection, where we included a photo of us that Barry and Sandra took of us as they chugged past us in their narrowboat. They’ve very kindly emailed us some more of their photos, which we’re looking at while we wistfully remember what good weather and calm water looks like!

We’ve included more of their photos – with big thanks to them – below for you to enjoy too, and hope they’re having a slightly less dramatic time than we’ve been having!

14/07/10 22:00

celebrityrow — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 10:46:58 +0000

My worst fears were realised! It was always a big call to get from West Storthwick to Hull in one tide … and a risky strategy as we didn’t have the experience of Paul Williams with us. It all started well: we were rowing up to speeds of 10 knots and enjoying being back on Oyster Shack. The decision of trying to get to Hull seemed good.

We turned the corner called The Trent Falls, where the Trent and Ouse join together to form the Humber, at about 3 o’clock. We were under the impression it was only about 7 miles to Hull and that we had a whole hour before the tide turned. The Humber bridge loomed in the far distance and we were still rowing fast! As I came off my shift, I almost hoped the ‘A’ team would bring us in this shift.

However we had somewhat mis-calculated the distance. Although we were still rowing at 6 knots, the hour came and went without even getting to the bridge!!

The team seemed to be ignoring the eventuality of our position. Kiwi was the first to say that we should moor up alongside some boats, but as we were still gaining good ground he was ignored!

I repeatedly said we needed a plan ‘B’, but the early trip problems of having too many chiefs on board came back to haunt us as – like normal – these warnings continually fell on deaf or ignorant ears and we all did our own things!

Speeds lowered and lowered as the headwind forced us to try and crank up the pace as we came under the hugely impressive bridge. Again, it seemed not everyone seemed to realise the urgency of our situation.

We swapped shifts again, and it was now 5 o’clock – a full hour after we’d been warned not to be on the Humber without mooring and the wind and rain came down. I was so relieved to get into solitary cabin, but remarkably we could still not see the marina – and we were still ignorant of the danger we had put the boat in.

I was just falling asleep when ‘bang!’ – for the second time on our trip, we grounded.

This time it seemed the rowing team were aware we would but gave no warning, The centre board was out and, before I had opened the hatch, half the ‘A’ crew had abandoned ship! They were up to their knees in mud with ropes deployed, trying to beach the boat!!!

The reality of the situation was that the water was coming in so fast that the boat would be dashed against rocks on the nearing shoreline within the hour!!

Fortunately, we were being monitored by the Humber Coast Guard, and within moments a rig was alongside us! Dave and his merry bunch of lads were fantastic. They got a line on us and carefully pulled us away from the danger.

It still took another 2 hours to be towed the couple of miles that we had failed to row: it had been a harsh lesson. Poor Paul Wiiliams’ first sight of us was being rescued and towed into the marina!!

We’re all ready to continue our journey. We need to get the boat in order today and not ignore the force 10 gale warnings! So it’s a days rest in Hull …

14/07/10 13:49

celebrityrow — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 18:27:08 +0000

13:49 14/07/10 We all seem in better spirits today. Maybe because we all sub- conciously feel we’re on the last leg of our ordeal or maybe because we’re all happy to be off Tiger and back on the Ocean rower, Oyster Shack! Anyway it doesn’t matter why….it’s just a relief! We had to leave the marina at West Storthwick by 11:15 to make the best of the tidal flow. The crew worked well together as Ian & Kiwi went food shopping including Matti’s treats and the rest of us concentrated on getting Tiger out and Oyster Shack into the water. Mark had brought up the boat behind the Defender and we quickly got the 2 boats swapped over! Once all the essentials were aboard I read Ben Kay’s motivational blog to the lads…with many high fives and shouts of ‘come on’ the blog did the trick…we were mentally prepared for the next perilous and dangerous leg. Thanks Benny…you were great to have aboard, I just wish it was two of the harder rowing days that you had joined us for!! We set off leaving my brother J to sort out the misbehaving GPS tracker and Mark to take back Tiger to Leicester ! We’ve now done a one hour shift each and have covered 13 miles…hopefully on time to reach Hull. Paul Williams our experienced off shore rower is not rejoining us until we reach Hull…and if we don’t before tide turns we will need to moor up somewhere! The real frightening thing about this is that none of us has put down anchor before…specially in a fast flowing estuary!!

13/07/10 22:00

celebrityrow — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 07:47:17 +0000

22:00 13/07/10

The day finished as it had started…with 7 tired men in a row boat!!

The weather didn’t help…being wet and miserable isn’t a great way to enjoy life!

Our original aim today was to get to the marina at West Stockwith…about a 30 mile row…but with weather closing in and the lock at West Stockwith shuting at 4pm, we changed objective to Gainsborough….oh dear what a mistake!!

We moored up looking forward to an early night at 6pm in Gainsborough only to be met by a group of youths. It was immediately apparent that if we left Tiger in the ‘secure’ waterways mooring till morning, it would have been out for a joy ride within minutes!! At least the kids didn’t hide this fact and it made an easy decision….more rowing!!

There are few moorings on this part of the Trent as it is tidal…so the days objective of West Stockwith became the evenings objective!!

Fortunately Andy had built quite a telephone rapport with the lock keeper, Neil, and he agreed he would open the lock specially for us at 8pm.

We got to the lock and we must thank Sue who came out in the rain from the lock keepers cottage and helped us in!!

Brother J has been a great driver today…adding a humourous twist to all our aches and pains! Also Sara, Paul’s WAG was a great cox on her second coxing day!

Tomorrow could be full of perils…the waterways guide quotes as follows; ‘Nowhere else in Britain will the navigator be exposed to so much water and so little bank. Many boaters, regaled with tales of the fearsome nature of these waters will do anything to avoid passage’!!

To add to our worries of this comment our experienced Atlantic rower, Paul, rejoins us after this stint…in Hull! We also saw a mini oil tanker style barge going so fast around a corner on the river that anything in it’s way could only now be used as firewood!

The weather forecast isn’t good..rain and wind for the next few days – and the wrong wind! We need Southerlys to blow us up the Scottish coast..we’ve now got to face cold headwinds from the North….exactly what we didn’t want!!

Tomorrows objectives: change boat back to Oyster Shack and row to Hull in one tide! Highwater is at 11am…we’ll then only have 6 hours to go 30 miles or we’ll have problems!!

13/07/10 14:20

celebrityrow — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 13:44:10 +0000

14:20 13/07/10 All seems sombre again! We’re all feeling very tired and therefore there is little banter on Tiger this morning. Even Ian, tongue in cheek, threatened to jump overboard and swim home!! It’s exactly 2 weeks since we left and 2 weeks of just rowing does get a little monotanous!! We’re all on schedule…Oyster Shack is coming up tomorrow ready for the final leg. So nothing too humourous to report today! Fortuanately my brother, J, has come to help with the driving duties till Thursday. Luckily he’s always cheerful and helping getting a few smiles! Again technology is failing us! The GPS is still stuck and this iPhone is a complete pain as I never seem to get signal. In the words of Ian…let’s just row!!

Any words of encouragement, jokes, or photos to get the crew smiling would be greatly appreciated!

12/07/10 17:00

celebrityrow — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 09:19:13 +0000

17:00 12/07/10 It seems the GPS is still not locating us – so sorry to you all who have been following us on that. According to the GPS we’re still enjoying the party in Leicester – nothing could be further from the truth as we have got the flow of the Trent behind us! We moored Tiger alongside a narrow boat called Tigress last night…hope they behaved! Then it was an early start at 7am. Sarah Wilkins from Lumbers joined us as add additional crew member to cox…but was easily persuaded to row and she has some power in those arms!!

Last night we set a new speed record in the gig at 8.9 knots and with the same flow behind us today we made good ground upto Carlton on Trent just north of Newark. We’re all getting excited about the last leg. Mark is driving Oyster Shack up towards us and we expect our final change tomorrow or Wednesday at the latest. Strangely I’m looking forward to getting back into the Ocean rower and getting on with the perilous last leg.

The Kiwi Connection

celebrityrow — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 16:39:25 +0000

You might have noticed a recent comment on the blog from Barry and Sandra, who passed us in their narrowboat a few miles and rather a lot of locks ago. Barry – another Kiwi – also took the following fantastic photo of us as they pottered past us, and they have very kindly allowed us to reprint it here:

Not only that, but they were kind enough to include a link to our website on their own blog – which you can read at http://nbnorthernpride.blogspot.com/2010/07/onto-oxford-canal.html – and have offered to send us over more photos of our brave crew in action. Barry and Sandra, we salute you – enjoy the rest of your holiday in England!!

11/07/10 22:55

celebrityrow — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 09:47:02 +0000

11/07/10
We rowed long and hard upto the party in Nottingham….doing the 25 miles 45 minutes ahead of schedule and having to delay our arrival by sun bathing on the bank of the Trent!!

Ex-Nottingham Forest player Steve Hodge joined us in the boat at Via Fossa along with a crowd of well wishers!! Here’s an interesting fact on World Cup final day…Steve played in the infamous game against Argentina when Diego Maradonna scored with his hand…Steve swapped shirts with Diego at the end of the game and still has this most infamous piece of sporting memorabilia in his collection!!

The mood continued to be down beat for the day…less banter than normal with Ian in one of his planning moods ensuring that we didn’t repeat yesterdays late arrival for the party.
Thank you all who supported the event – in which the donation bucket received a very healthy balance!

We rowed another 2 hours after we departed the party to Hoverington and have had fantastic hospitality from close friends of Andy…Steve and Alison. Pizza in front of a recorded World Cup final to which 3 of us slept through most.

Tomorrow has Lumbers’ valuer, Sarah, coming to cox the crew…we’ll see if we listen to her more than we do to Paul when he’s coxing!!

11/07/10 13:00

celebrityrow — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 09:43:51 +0000

11/07/10 13:00

It really seems like the day after the Lord Mayors party! It’s a very sombre, reflective group of rowers today. We have so enjoyed having 3 nights in our own beds, seeing our families each night and celebrating our achievements to date at the party!
Although still excited about the continuing adventure it just feels remarkably sad to now being rowing away from home….the trip so far has always been towards homes and loved ones!!
I have much more sympathy for the contestants on ‘Celebrity Get me out of here’….wishing I had a similar magical phrase that would then whisk me away to a 5 Star hotel with all the family waiting!!

Anyway that is not an option so we’re back to rowing with a timetable!
Our aim is to get to the Nottingham welcome at Via Fossa wine bar by 4pm and not be as late as we yesterday!

I would have enjoyed a lie in this morning…especially as it’s Sunday! But no such luck. We set off by 6:30 and have had a hard morning session. We stopped for a Big Mac at The Otter which was kindly bought up to us by Tat Mattioli…Ian’s brother….I still can’t quite believe he bought 25 sausage and egg Macmuffins and 50 hash browns for the 7 of us…..we won’t be shopping for lunch or dinner!

I’m told the GPS hasn’t updated…but we’ve done well with the help of Lee Mattioli, Ian’s nephew, who has been rowing with us today. He has done remarkably well keeping up with the pace of the rest of us. We are currently at Cranfleet 6 miles south of Nottingham. Looking forward to tonight…hope we can find somewhere to watch the World Cup Final!!

Photos from the Half-Way Party at Colourworks in Leicester

celebrityrow — Sun, 11 Jul 2010 13:18:36 +0000

Thanks to everyone who turned out to help cheer us on – and pass us the occasional glass of Pimms! – at the half-way party at Colourworks restaurant in Leicester on Saturday afternoon. Apologies for the stylishly late entrance – maybe they were getting their revenge for that record-breaking we did at Foxton, but the locks too against in the last mile or two! – but it was wonderful to see everyone and to get such a great welcome.

Thanks to Willie Thorne, not just a champion snooker player but an auctioneer extraordinare: your efforts certainly swelled the coffers! Thanks to Andy Abraham, who we think used up a entire waitress’ order pad signing endless autographs. Thanks to Virtual Viewing, our web partners, without whom the website, the GPS tracking, the Twitter feed and this blog wouldn’t have happened (and thank you for taking these photos too!).

Tiger and crew raise their oars in salute as they arrive

… and are welcomed ashore by the waiting crowd

The crew with Stewart Bailey, MD of Virtual Viewing, our web partners (to whom thanks for these photos, as well as the blog, website, GPS tracking and Twitter feed)

Dom and Willie Thorne whip up the crowd for the auction bidding

Swelling the coffers with the raffle draw

Andy Abraham signs the third of many, many autographs

Even the good ship Oystercatcher was there

10/7/10 22:00

celebrityrow — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 22:20:21 +0000

22:00 10/07/10
What a day – full of a few lows (that don’t need repeating in Captain’s blog!) and many highs.

The welcome we got at Colourworks in Leicester was amazing – there must have been at least 200 people cheering us in – and I just want to thank each and everyone of you! It felt fantastic rowing the last 500 yards – I know Ben has run out in front of 100,000 fans at Twickenham…but this is as good as it gets for us mere mortals!!

I really must thank my Lumbers team and all those that helped, including my step children, Greg & Maddie, for making the venue look and sound fabulous. I loved the air horns all hooting as all the rowers pulled together and came in at speed!!

The day hadn’t been all that smooth: we felt it was an easy day with not far to row by the 4pm deadline … we got that wrong! We started well enough and made good time to Kibworth from Foxton. But we had been promised a Pimms reception by the lovely inhabitants of Newton Harcourt between 12 & 1.

We were ahead of schedule so were delighted that Ben’s wife, Ginny, and girls came out with iced lollies at Kibworth. Then we arrived gracefully at Newton Harcourt …, well until Ian let our professional image suffer by allowing himself to fall into the canal between the boat and bank, much to the raptuous laughter of the ensembled crowd. He now has the award of being the first – and I’m sure not the last – to take a canal bath! Great thanks to the Mitchell family who organised the Pimms party – we really enjoyed it!!

Onwards to Leicester with our rendezvous time – and we still had 15 miles and 15 locks to go in only 3 hours! By now we had got into the city boundaries. We had done over 200 locks from Sharpness to Leicester, every one of them in fine working order and a tribute to the waterways. So how come our own city can’t maintain the locks? 3 out of the last 4 were a nightmare with the gates broken and the keys not working: how sad!

So we were now running very late and were getting quite stressed that our 4 o’clock entrance was heading more towards 5! Past the Walkers stadium and we suddenly heard cheering and air horns. Wow, it was sensational!!

A few more celebs came down to meet us: Willie Thorne kindly ran through a quick auction for the charities and he was accompanied by Andy Abrahams from the X-Factor!! Tigers Martin Corry, Matt Poole and Darren Grewcock all showed their support by bringing their families along: great to see you all!!

Also thanks to many of our sponsors for coming – Stewart Bailey and his fiancé Veronika who make this blog possible by designing all our websites at Virtual Viewing; Chris Sturgess from Sturgess LandRover, and Simon Chaulk from Woodvale Challenge who has very kindly lent us the boats to row!

We partied for an hour, but our adventure still has a long way to go. So we had to set off for Sileby – which took us another 3 hours! Tomorrow is Nottingham: another event on the riverfront at 4pm … Do come and join us!!

10/07/10 08:00

celebrityrow — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 09:40:00 +0000

10/07/10 08:00
Andy, Gary and Simon have arrived – just waiting for the Discovery with Ian and Paul!
Today’s route takes us from Foxton to Gumley, Smeeton Westerby, Wistow, Newton Harcourt, South Wigston, Blaby (just 500 yards from home!), Aylestone, and central Leicester by 4pm!
We’ve got a thirst on for a Pimms at Newton Harcourt…but we’ll have to shift to be at Colourworks by 4….
We’re really enjoying this home section …it’s been great having a couple of nights at home!

9/07/10 22:15

celebrityrow — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 09:36:46 +0000

22:15 9/07/10
The day was as fun as hoped!! We got to Foxton Locks far too early – we aimed to be there at 5 o’clock and arrived at 3 having had a very leisurely row! I don’t think Ben Kay was impressed although at least he now has joined the inner circle of those who have been through a 1 mile tunnel without an engine!!

Having arrived at Foxton we were met by 2 really helpful lock keepers – they confirmed the record time to get down the 10 locks was 29 minutes and they were up for us trying to beat it!!!
Ian and Paul were boat crew, Andy front rope to power the boat from lock to lock, Simon and Kiwi onto the lock keys and finally Ben and I to open the gates!! A large crowd quickly gathered to watch the spectacle! Lock 1 was done in under 3 minutes, the record was definitely within sight!! 9 locks later the watch was stopped at 20 minutes and 40 seconds…..nearly 9 minutes quicker than the previous best and the second record of our adventure!!

We were joined at Foxton Locks by Claude Henderson from LCCC, Matt Poole, Tigers legend and 3 Tigers academy stars – Matt Everard, Manu Tuilagi and Ryan Blowers. We got them into the boat for a speed trial …Paul coxed, Ben took stroke, Matt, Claude, Manu and Ryan joined me making the 7! Let’s put it this way we may need some more practice before getting this crew to beat our current speed record of 7.8 knots!!

Tomorrow could be a long day! We need to be at the party at Colourworks by 4pm. We’ve got 20 miles and 16 locks of Leicestershire to do before that. Wistow, Newton Harcourt, South Wigston, Blaby and on into Leicester for hopefully a reception!

Look forward to seeing you there!!

9/07/10

celebrityrow — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 11:24:27 +0000

11:20 9/07/10
Kiwi is no longer the biggest lad on the boat! We’ve picked up Ben Kay on the way to North Kilworth and we are now all feeling short!
Should be a fun day today. We’ve got Ben in the crew for 2 days and not too far to row!
We’re being joined at Foxton Locks by Martin Corry and some of the rising stars of the Tigers academy. We’re trying to find out if there is a record for doing the 10 lock staircase and if so we’ll try and smash it!
Also joining us at Foxton Locks at 5 o’clock today will be Leicestershire cricketer, Claude Henderson, who will be presented the June Lumbers Player of the Month Award.
As I said – a fun day- so come and join us at Foxton!

Tomorrow’s row through Leicestershire, should be great. We will be going through the village of Newton Harcourt at about lunchtime, and aiming for our party at Colourworks at 4pm. See you there!

8/07/10 18:00

celebrityrow — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 18:42:09 +0000

18:00 8/07/10
An easy day! 19 miles, 10 locks and 1 tunnel…easy for a well oiled crew like us!

We got going by 8:15 and headed
off towards Crick. This was fun for me as I could recognise everywhere as I had lived locally in Yelvertoft for 10 years!

Crick tunnel was the first fun of the day…about a mile in length – but unlike yesterday’s tunnel we had traffic problems! 3 narrow boats coming towards us and one catching us up behind quickly! To be fair our lights were sub standard equipment for such an experience…2 head torches worn by Ian and Kiwi! The first boat that passed us weren’t too polite to us and the second even less so!
We nearly lost Ian overboard – he was at the bow of the boat pushing off the walls with the handle of the oar – the next second he had thumped onto the deck with a large bang! The handle had got stuck in a gap between 2 bricks and pushed him over – much to the rest of our amusement !

We had to stop at Yelvertoft to visit the Knightly Arms for lunch where my mum came up trumps making sandwiches for the crew as the pubs kitchens are being refitted!

Boys will be boys and with Ian on the boat we have one of the more mischievous ones! A small splash by Simon resulted in a full blown water fight with the main agressor being Ian sided by Paul and Simon against the rest of us.

We’ve moored up at North Kilworth and have got tomorrow morning off!
It’s another easy day just 6 miles to Foxton locks by 5pm!

Tonight we’ve got the event in Birmingham, hosted by sick note Matt Poole with our guest rower for the next 2 days…Leicester Tigers and England legend, Ben Kay.

Then we’re all looking forward to a night’s z’s at our own homes….all of us except Kiwi of course!!

9/07/10 06:40

celebrityrow — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 08:05:11 +0000

06:40 09/07/10
Yesterday ended in, what’s become, the routine panic! We finished rowing too late so missed last food orders! But the Countryman wad great as we phoned ahead for bangers and mash and it was waiting when we got there!

Yesterday was a long day and my arms are feeling it this morning with some extra aches and pains! But in adventure value it was a fun finale to the day as we managed the 1.5mile Braunston tunnel! The tunnel is
14 feet wide so not big enough for us the row in….so some imaginative rowing strokes were used. Ian, Kiwi and Paul managed to stand and use the oar as a paddle. I found that my balance in the dark, because of the removal of my right balance nerve when I had a brain tumour removed, didn’t allow me to stand. So Andy and I sat and tried to paddle. It was fantastic fun in the pitch black but used a different set of shoulder muscles resulting in today’s pain!

We’ve had 2 fabulously comfortable nights at Liz Jarrett’s in Staverton. It really is a beautiful place to stay – email us if you want details! We were even entertained by Andy using Liz’s grandson’s, Josh, drumset yesterday morning – I didn’t realise Andy played in a band!

It’s a short today as we head into our home county of Leicestershire!
We’re also having our first fund raising event in Birmingham tonight which, as we are so far away from, we will drive to!!

Over the next few days I’ll try and keep you more regularly updated with where we are….why not come and join us when we have one of our stops!

Today will be turning left at Napton, then we’ll aim for Crick, Yelvertoft and Cold Ashby before we finish at 4!

7/07/10 09:00

celebrityrow — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 11:39:14 +0000

09:00 07/07/10
A late start this morning not helped by the fact that we set off back to Warwick from the very hospitable Colledges House and forgot all our rowing kit!! Luckily we were only 10 minutes down the road when we remembered and did a hasty U turn!

Currently stock piling food from Tesco Express for today. We’ve set another ambitious destination and will have no time for a pub lunch.
Looks like it might be foul weather gear too….rain looks immenient.

Tonight will be the same as last night – so apologies for the GPS showing that we shot upto Staverton! We’ll be in the Countryman hopefully by 21:30 tonight!

6/07/10 23:52

celebrityrow — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 07:32:50 +0000

10:52 6/07/10
We made it!! It’s been an absolute killer of an afternoon with a massive amount of locks! I think it’s something like 42 locks today!

We moored off the Staircase to Heaven outside Warwick just before 5pm.
Alan found us and bought a six pack of lager tinnies which was a good tonic before the challenge! Boaters moored up there told us 3 hours minimum to 5 hours to get down the flight of locks…the days final challenge had been set…..how quick could we do it??
We split into 2 teams…boat team of Paul, Ian and Andy, lock team of Kiwi and Simon….I was, again, chief fund collector and floater to help where needed!
Anyway we flew down in 1 hour 40 minutes…. Is this a new record??
It’s the first time we’ve seen Kiwi absolutely tired out…racing from lock to lock raising the gates!!

Panic began to set in when it became apparent that every hotel locally is fully booked…but what are friends for? I managed to phone a great friend in Staverton, Liz Jarrett who has managed to fit us all in tonight!

We did have a little drama at the end of the day….not surprisingly Alan our land support team got upset with us when we changed our plans for the umptenth time and walked off….fortuanately Ian managed to persuade him back!! We also went through 2 locks too many and we had to go backwards up the locks to get the boat into a safe mooring bay outside The Good Hope pub! Coincidentally they are huge Tigers fans and we’ll get some signed shirts to send back to them for looking after Tiger!

Talking of Tiger reminds me of another story that I didn’t share with you early this week. Paul’s girlfriend coxed us for a day when we got to Evesham. As she departed we got in the boat and continued the row to the next lock….where, very kindly, was stood the landlord of the pub we’d been in. He held aloft a very fetching pair of Tiger print Armani pants and asked ID they belonged to any of the team…Paul had to confess that Sara had bought him some and he’d left them in the pub…at which point the landlord also raised the other contents of the bag Paul had forgotton…all very racy animal print underware!
Down Tiger!

Tomorrow is another lock day…some 20 to get through and hopefully a finish to go through Braunstone Tunnel…we had a 400 metre tunnel today which was wet, damp, cold and dark,..but tomorrows is 2 miles!

6/07/10 12:15

celebrityrow — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 16:08:22 +0000

12:15 06/07/10
Another WAG day!! This time it’s the turn of Andy’s wife, Anna, to join us! She’s fitted on well – fortunately she doesn’t offend easily and has reacted well to any risky men comments made!! Mind you her driving skills have been questioned as we were steered from bank to bank during her 15 minutes in the cox seat!! I can’t believe she has any no claims bonus on her car insurance!!

We made tracks at 8:30 and the four hours have got us 7 locks up the canal – only 5 miles! It’s an afternoon of 9 locks and 3 miles to Kingswood Junction!

Meanwhile we’re getting a crafty pint and pie in the Fleur De Lys pub, Lowsonford. I think Warwick will be too far for today…but we’ll try!

5/07/10 23:00

celebrityrow — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 08:20:25 +0000

11:00 5/07/10

We’re delighted with today’s final destination! We’ve made it beyond Stratford to Wilmcote. In distance this isn’t a great success, but at the minute we’re not measuring distance in miles, but by how many locks we’ve been through! Today before Stratford we had a fair distance of 15 miles but only 7 locks. Since Stratford we have done 4 miles but 17 locks!! This is now 17 less that we need to open tomorrow!!
We’re working on average of 10 minutes per lock – so they are a real nuisance!! We’re certainly worried about Warwick where they have a flight of 21 locks called Staircase to Heaven….I think we may need to rename Staircase of Hell!!!

The quick pint in the Four Alls in Welford on Avon created an interest. Alan had been out and bought a fishing rod. Ian decided to show everyone what a good fisherman he is and caught 4 Chubs in as many minutes. Both Kiwi and Paul both caught one each too!

We had great fun fund raising in Statford where I went ashore with the Rainbows bucket whilst the crew circled the boat outside the Royal Shakespere theatre. The funniest incident happened when someone noticed the Lumbers logo on my shirt and explained to me how often they shopped at Lumbers! It gave them quite a shock when I explained who I was under the seadog beard!!

However our experienced Atlantic rower, Paul, had to leave us to return to work …he’s been fantastic, a really important team member and I hope he can join us for the North Sea! Thanks for everything Paul!

Stratford was very generous into the bucket which is now so heavy it’s being touted as extra ballast for the boat!!

We finished in a village called Wilmcote…famous for being the village of the birthplace of Shakespeare’s mother! We’re staying in the Mary Arden pub…a real treasure of a find having had a great dinner!

Tomorrow will be judged on locks rather than distance again. We will be pleased if we can get to Warwick and experience the Staircase of Heaven! At least it’s a 8:30 start rather than a Mattioli start!!

5/07/10 12:30

celebrityrow — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 15:03:57 +0000

12:30 05/07/10
We made a mistake this morning!!! We all took it in turns to have 15 minutes in the cox position, so we had to have Kiwi in the hot seat.
So why do I call this a mistake?? Within 5 minutes he had introduced us to ‘Fartlek’ training. Its an Olympic training method where we would up the power of the row every 10 strokes! This would be 10 normal, 10 at 3/4 flat out then 10 flat out… it certainly got the heart beat rate in the boat up!! We also have a GPS tracker on board that shows our speed to which we posted a record 7.6knots at one stage!

Current location is 4 miles south of Stratford … so we are aiming to get through tonight, some of the 36 locks on the agenda for tomorrow.

One piece of housekeeping…I apolgise if Andy’s aunt took offence over any background comment she may have overheard when speaking to Andy earlier! For the record the oar handles have an option of a rubber sleeve on them -this softens the wood to hand and theory is protects your blisters. Of course this naturally lends to the nick named of condoms. Some of us like them and some don’t , so when she overheard me ask Andy ‘condom on or off??’ there was no sexual connatation!

Party with the crew

celebrityrow — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 10:51:49 +0000

As you might have realised if you’ve been following the blog, all this rowing is obviously very thirsty work!

(The crew even managed to wind up behind the bar in this pub in Minehead: as you can see, they’re a gregarious lot).

If you’d like to buy them a beer or two (and remember to save a few pennies for the collection bucket too – all this hard work is being fearlessly undertaken for some very good causes), you’ve got three opportunities coming up.

The crew will be throwing three parties in the coming days as they pass through the heartlands of England, so why not join them, raise a glass or two and keep their spirits – and their fund-raising total – up?

Birmingham – Thursday 8th July 2010, 7 – 9pm
Pitcher Piano
The Water’s Edge, Brindley Place
Birmingham B1 2HP

Leicester – Saturday 10th July 2010, 4 – 6pm
with special guests Willie Thorne and Andy Abrahams
The Colourworks
2 Westbridge Close
Leicester LE3 5LW

Nottingham – Sunday 11th July, 2010 4 – 6pm
Via Fossa
44 Canal Street
Nottingham NG1 7EH