Boathooks and magnets

I had occasion to go up to Milton Keynes today, from Berkhamsted which is where I am moored.  Relying on public transport and shank's pony, I did not get back to Berhamsted until about 19:40 and had been travelling virtually continuously since 10:30.  After walking most of the way back to my boat (about a 30 minute walk) and looking forward to something to eat and a rest, I got to the lock just above my mooring and saw two Wyvern boats (the nearest hire boat company) moored right by the locks.  By the lock side was James Griffin the owner of Wyvern boats, and somebody I have met a number of times.  We chatted briefly, and it became apparent that the rearmost of the two Wyvern boats had managed to drop their rear fender into the lock near the downhill gates.  This was quite an achievement in itself - the fenders that Wyvern use are rope covered metal cylinders stoppered at one end with rubber.  The cylinder is about one foot in diameter, and perhaps 18" in length.  It is normally bolted to the boat, and then additionally secured by a safety chain.  The person running the boat must have caught the fender on the bottom gate or rammed the gate fairly hard going in reverse - or both.  Anyway, James was trying to recover the fender from the full lock using magnets he had brought out, but they were proving insufficiently powerful to lift the fender, though he could locate and attach to the fender with the magnets.  After chatting for a little while I went down to my boat to pick up a boat hook that has a very large, sharp point, but which has a broken shaft.  Returning to the lock, we attached this hook to one of the Wyvern boat's barge poles, put the boat back in the lock, emptied it and went fishing with the resulting boat hook and the magnets.  We could locate the fender but we could not retrieve it.  Whilst this was going on, one of the women on the boat was providing coffee and biscuits.  After trying for a good while to stab it; hook it; lift it; shift it, we opened the lower gate to try and trap it between the gate and the lock wall.  At this point it became obvious that the fender was in such a position that the gate was having to go over the fender to open, and that two times out of three it was stopping the lock operating.  After continued unsuccessful efforts, we eventually called a halt.  I recovered my boat hook and walked back to the boat to finally get something to eat and drink and to sit down to rest and do this blog at about 21:30.  Not what I expected to be doing as I was coming back to the boat.