Wednesday, 17 October 2007

Final stuff in Burton, and then away from Alrewas

14th to 17th October

With not far to go on Sunday, we made a late start and went down to Horninglow for a self pump out. Horninglow is marked on the guides as a full length (i.e. 70 foot) winding hole, but I wouldn’t want to try it. The end on moorings make it difficult to get the stern round, and for once I took two goes to get it right.

Once alongside the service block, it’s great – you are parallel to the aforesaid moored boats, so passing craft have relatively little effect, which is always welcome when pumping the contents of the loo tank out.

Having given it a good rinse, after the two rather poor efforts it has had recently, we pulled across to the towpath side and moored for the night. Bits of Burton can be a problem overnight – there’s a good looking set of moorings at Shobnall Fields (see later) but the park they are alongside is used by two kinds of businesses at night – pushers and pimps - and it doesn’t make for a comfortable night.

There’s no problem at Horninglow, though, as there isn’t at the Shobnall Boatyard just by the Marston’s Brewery. The signpost by our mooring said 25 minutes into town, so we tested it in the afternoon by walking to the town centre Sainsbury’s. It took us 30 minutes of brisk walking, and then we were just on the near edge of the centre. On this basis, the moorings just mentioned near the Marston’s Brewery are slightly better for town centre access.

On Monday, I had two eye appointments, a visual fields test at 9, and a consultant appointment at ten past two. This latter had originally been for 9.30, which would have been great, but the clinic had had to reschedule. From where we were moored, we could walk in in 15 minutes, we discovered. Since we’d estimated 20, and allowed 30, we were there a bit early. No matter, the clinic was very efficient, and by half nine we were heading back to the boat.

We now had some time to kill before the afternoon appointment, so we moved the boat to the Shobnall Fields mooring, which are even closer to the hospital. There’s no difficulty mooring there during the day – it’s only at night that there’s a problem.

My second visit to the clinic was also handled very efficiently, and all seems to be well with my peepers, or would be if it were not for the drops they put in them. These dilate your pupils and prevent your eyes from focussing, so you go round in a blur and wearing shades for a few hours. The sun promptly came out in what was, I am sure, a glorious Autumn evening, but I was in no state to appreciate it.

We moved the boat (Sheila steering!) out of Burton a bit – we wanted to be in Alrewas by 10.30 on Tuesday, so as to take part in the Willy Walk for the last time this year. In fact we were able to get as far as Barton Turn. This is one of those place names that has changed itself with time. Officially, it’s Barton Turn, as it’s where you leave the A38 for Barton-under-Needwood, but the marina here calls itself Barton Turns, so most boaters call the whole place that. Very irritating to obsessives like myself.

My vision was slowly improving, but not enough to compose lots of this verbiage, so I just stuck a holding message on the blog and went back to reading in a dim light, holding the book in the one position on which I could focus.

Tuesday was a moist morning, but very pleasant. We got away by 7.50, me steering now my vision was back to normal, and arrived at Alrewas at 9. We tied on the water point, and I left Sheila watching the tank fill whilst I nipped in to the village for a paper and a last batch of pasties.

The walk was one we hadn’t done before, alongside the Trent upstream from the village, and then across country to Wychnor Church, and so back along the canal and river.

In the pub, since it was the last time for a bit, I had the mixed grill. These are often disappointing, but on this occasion it was just right, with a good range of bits of meat, enough chips and some green peas.

After lunch, it was Sheila’s turn to visit the hospital. That generous man, Will Chapman, gave us a lift back to Burton so that Sheila could have an X-ray of her stiff shoulder. As I’ve said before in this place, life would not be impossible without good friends like Will and Jane, but it would be a lot harder.

Today we had a relaxed and misty start. I bought a last bit of meat from the butcher – two enormous pieces of hip bone steak, one to have for Sheila’s birthday later this year, and one to have for Christmas. Then we set off with that sensation of release that always comes when we’ve finished with Alrewas for another six months. It’s a great place, but we are very much wandering stars, and it’s always good to be on our way again.

We stopped in Fradley to diesel up, and then came on to the towpath outside Kings Bromley marina, arriving just on lunchtime. Tomorrow we’ll press on through Rugeley and wend our way up to Great Haywood over the next couple of days.

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