Whilst wandering around Canterbury we’d seen street kiosks selling river trips, and as it was a lovely sunny afternoon, decided to strike whilst the sun shone.
We reviewed the information cards we’d collected on the three options over lunch. Two were discounted: “Canterbury Historic River Tours”:http://www.canterburyrivertours.co.uk/ as we’d seen the small inflatables which were rowed crammed with teenagers and “Westage Punts”:http://canterburypunts.uk/ took you out of town on the Great River Stour. We settled on “Canterbury Punting Co”:http://www.canterburypunting.co.uk/pages/1 as it took us around the city on a traditional punt and at £12.50 each seemed reasonable.
A helpful young lady, with a booth on the main street, gave us a ticket for the next ‘punting’ at 1pm and directed us down Stour Street to Water Lane Coffee a small café where we bought the tickets.
Our punt took eight and we went down half a dozen steps to the river where we were helped in. Because the river is very shallow the boats are low, and we sat on cushions and rugs in two sections, with two facing two. You could stretch your legs out but we all wondered how we would get out (surprisingly well in the end).
Our guide/boatman was Sebastian who gave the brief mandatory health and safety tour before setting off. He was a good raconteur, and provided a running commentary, managed to duck under the very low bridges and make steering the heavy wooden punt appear easy. We passed other boats, but it never felt crowded because the river was so narrow and in some places, it was literally one way. Being on the river gave us a different perspective and allowed us to see new born ducklings and moor hens at close quarters.
The trip took around 45 minutes and is recommended for relaxing.
