All hands on deck

Wandered down to the beach this afternoon where the RNLI lifeboat volunteers were hosting an open day to raise funds.

The RNLI is a charity which is totally reliant on public donation to maintain the station and its equipment, the volunteer crew are unpaid and are on call 24 hours a day every day of the year. The station covers an area of the Forth estuary between Elie Ness/Aberlady to the east and as far as Inchcolm/Granton to the west.

This was the crew returning from a rescue demonstration and judging by this photo it seems it helps if you have two pairs of hands. It's not for me though, by the time it would take me to put on the one piece dry suit with built in wellies they'd be halfway across the river - although I do fancy the helmet.