Today I'm recovering after a day on the boat. Not my boat, obviously, but a day hire boat. Kate, Simon and I hired one out for a location scout on the Broads. The weather forecast promised rain, but it was glorious sunshine all day (apart from the ten minutes where we were mooring the boat when it rained so much and so hard I thought we were going to sink), so much so that I'm currently burned to a crisp! It was absolutely beautiful out there on the rivers and broads, I can't believe I haven't done it since I was a kid, especially considering it's less than half an hour up the road and cheap as chips.

We took our little picnic boat out at Wroxham and chugged along the waterways through Horning and up to Ranworth. Here we met Jen (the director), Tania (the DoP) and Nathan (who had nothing better to do), grabbed some lunch in a nearby pub, then set sail (well, set engine) and travelled a bit further downstream. There are some magnificent locations – including an old 14th Century Abbey which is supposed to be haunted by a monk who was skinned alive and nailed to the door, nice! – and we're definitely hoping to use some for the film. The week on the boat is the one I'm most excited about, as hopefully it will feel like one big holiday!

The best thing about the trip, though, was the birds. There were so many of them – grebes, coots and we even saw about ten herons – and it was so wonderful to see them. Yes, I know, I'm starting to sound like my dad... The coots were my favourite. When you throw bread for them they stretch their wings and run along the water to catch it, it's such a funny thing to watch:



It's funnier when they're not in slow motion, but that's the only video I could find! And wouldn't it be so cool to be able to do that!

I'm going to try and get out on a boat a few times this year. My friend Tom, who runs Gatehouse Press, has just bought one, so I'm hoping to go down and take that out for a spin...

Just call me Captain Gordy!

Mind you, it was so knackering, even though you're just standing around doing nothing. Nathan, Jen and I came back to mine afterwards (after bumping into Lynsey and Lucy, coincidentally, and giving them a lift home, it's a small world) and we were going to watch a film, but we were all drifting off at about half nine. We just about had enough energy for a curry though :-)

Easter fair today, yay!