Wet and windy

2nd & 3rd November

It’s been a wet couple of days, but then everyone else in the UK probably knows that. We had a wet trip to Deer Farm Bend yesterday, calling at High Lane to pick up a paper on the way.

We were tied in good time and a break in the rain created a possibility to get a brief walk. We found that there were three geocaches on or just off the towpath nearby, and set out to find them. Unfortunately , they were all of our least favourite type, being microcaches (that is, 35mm film canisters) hidden in places overlooked by houses and with lots of passers-by.

It’s really difficult scratting around in leaf litter or under a bunch of nettles without attracting unfavourable attention from passing dog walkers. We managed to find two of the three, but with hindsight we would have had a more enjoyable walk if we’d just explored some of the numerous footpaths in the area.

Back at the boat, we were glad of the warmth from the stove and the chance to catch up with our reading. We’ve recently found another source of free e-books in the shape of the MobileRead Forums and have stocked up on some more tales by our favourite crime authors.

Apart from this, the other high spot was feeding a large flock of the local mallards from the side hatches. There was the usual scrum (or whatever the water polo equivalent is) and one drake, striving to catch a piece of bread flying over his head, fell over backwards rather in the way penguins are said to do in the Falklands when overflown by the RAF. There was a huge splash and indignant protests from the duck on which he landed.

It was rather a broken night, what with further bursts of rain, people wandering past in the late evening (no threat, exactly, just where on earth had they come from and were going to?) and the fact that the boat tied next to us, Ganesh, was loosely tied on piling hooks which squeaked backwards and forwards every time she rocked in the wind.

Even though you know what it is, it still wakes you up when it happens as you are dozing off.

As a result, today has been one of those days when we’ve both felt rather muzzy and on edge with each other. Fortunately, things have gone quite well. We had a straightforward trip to Marple, where I had a good physio session and we got a lot of shopping done.

There’s a certain amount of traffic about still, and a knot of it occurred by the service block just as we were getting ready to set off. There were breasted up boats on the water point and a boat held behind us waiting to take their place when Hakuna Matata came through, waited hanging on to the boat in front of us and then pinched the space on the water point when the breasted pair moved off.

It might not have been a problem for him, but it was certainly bad manners.

We’ve now come back to our mooring at Poynton. We’re waiting to hear if the shell is going to be delivered on Thursday, and we’re looking forward to an early night.