Working at the Festival 7

21st, 22nd & 23rd August

Well, I did say it would be a bit erratic! I'm very tired, so it's going to be brief, I'm afraid.

On Friday we had another list of fiddling about jobs to do, which we'd completed by lunchtime. The main genny, which had been giving problems, cutting out in the middle of the night in a false error state, was replaced late in the day; the substitute has been fine.

We went for a fish and chip supper at a local village hall, which was not quite as well organised as it might have been, sad to say. Leaving it to the last minute to order 88 portions of fish or chicken and chips from the chippy led to predictable delays in supply. In fact the first orders didn't arrive until after nine, a second delivery came at twenty to ten, and the final stuff didn't come until five past ten.

The hall also doubles as the village pub, so we could have a drink, but of course that only made things worse after a bit. I don't often have trouble with my blood sugar levels, but this was one time where I really wasn't sure if I was going to make it.

Yesterday and today has seen the transition from pre camp towards the full on WRG camp. It's great to meet folk we haven't seen all year, and to get back into the swing of the highly organised WRG approach to these matters.

The work has continued much the same, tweaking the fence, tidying verges, and clearing a hay crop off the campsite field. Elanor arrived last night, and has been settling into her role as brew hut fairy, sorting it out and organising the stuff which goes in there from the WRG kit trailers.

Many of the women are going off for a hen night tonight for one of the wrgies who's marrying another; I'm planning to eat dinner with WRG and have an early night.

Working at the Festival 6

20th August

We had a morning off yesterday, as we had a lift to the local IKEA with Jane from Slow Gin, the boat tied just inside us.

We were able to identify the chairs we plan to use on Sanity Again – more about this on the other blog in due course As soon as we get the plan from Peter Mason, I'll do another post over there.).

In the afternoon, Sheila was working with Jane in Admin, whilst the WRG team busied themselves with a lot of bits and pieces round the site, finishing by starting to lay the plastic sheet on the floor of the sleeping marquee. We ran out of sheet half way through, but Bungle was able to get some more later in the day and we finished the job this morning. It will be covered with carpet by the marquee contractor today, so that it's ready for use tonight.

There followed a quiet evening on the boat, the last for which I had to cook a meal. Tonight we're out at a fish and chip supper with many of the other workers, and tomorrow the WRG camp catering starts.

Working at the Festival 5

19th August

We're at the phase now of doing some bits of fencing and any other jobs that arise in the course of the day. Yesterday, we filled a trench by the side of the road that the boat lorries will come down, Alex fetching some fill from the marina yard in the telehandler bucket, and three of us supervising the pour into the hole, then clearing up around it.

Later in the day the two Bibby twins (known as the Tweedles to us) filled a smaller hole near the front entrance of the EA stand. There's going to be a fair bit of this next week, when we have the main WRG camp going and enough bodies to find and mark the holes, followed by a team using the dumper to fill them in.

We turned an informal gate (i.e. a loose panel) on the walking route from the workers' boats to the back of the WRG compound into a proper personnel gate, and locked it with a WRG padlock. Now that there are significant amounts of folk camping there, it makes sense to start maintaining security more thoroughly.

As a result of this, wheeled traffic has started to use the track which will be the entrance to the main campsite, so we marked out the edge of that track with lamp irons and hazard tape.

Final job of the day for me and some of the team was laying a strip of rubber mesh backed black carpet along the line which most of the visitors will use when queuing to enter. It meant opening a couple of fence panels and unrolling the length of stuff. It had, perhaps inevitably, been rolled so that the top surface was on the outside, which made it much harder to lay, of course, but with the aid of some strong muscle and a scaffold pole through the middle of the roll we managed in the end.

The marquees and cabins for the WRG camp are in position, so a start has been made on moving in the cookers and fridges to them. The next couple of days may well be mainly taken up with sorting the compound out so that it's ready for the first influx of wrgies on Saturday.

Working at the Festival 4

18th August

As I expected, yesterday was a day of tinkering with the fence line. We restructured the enclosures around admin village and the main entrance, and later in the day took a tour around the whole perimeter checking that all was still secure. Some of the stays needed repinning, but otherwise all was well.

The major job in the afternoon was back at problem corner. The site team had decided that there was no way we could get a trombo wagon with a 70 foot narrowboat round it as it stood, and it's on the route to where the land based boats will be craned in.

We'd got permission from the farmer to take down some of his permanent fence (which, to be honest, was a bit agricultural in appearance, being partly composed of pallets and old iron gates, held together with blue polyprop and bailer twine).

He came by just as we were taking a sledge hammer to some of this, and we had some further negotiation, shall we say, about just how much we were going to remove. This was settled entirely amicably, and in due course one of the Merlo telehandlers came along and pulled out some of the posts.

It really underlines the sheer power of one of those beasts when you see that it doesn't even cause the engine note to change as the jib rises, pulling a big post out of the ground like a rotten tooth.

The whole area now looks much better, which is good as it lies behind the IWA marquee site, and will be used for the Cressy Garden (no, I'm not sure, either).

In the evening, Bungle and his team turned up and installed the gennies and lines to supply power to the boats. It looks as if there's been an underestimation of the size needed to for one of the gennies, but we shall see. It appears to have coped overnight, but that's the easy bit.

Working at the Festival 3

17th August

Yesterday was a fairly typical day for the fencing team, in so far as we could be said to have one.

We started by taking down some fence we put up on Saturday, and moving it up to the tracking that had since been laid behind the bar area. (Yes, John, I agree, it's a lot like the OwnerShips Show, except it goes on for longer, and you have to walk a lot further!)

Then, as we were preparing to put crowd barrier around the Arena location, a wagon bringing in some Portakabins demonstrated that we hadn't left enough room for him to swing around a tight corner by catching a panel on the corner of the cabin and towing the fence a short distance.

We nipped over there and dismantled the wreckage, and assessed how we could reconstruct the corner to leave more room.

Meanwhile, I managed to gain an advantage in the chronic struggle to get the use of the telehandler to bring the packs of crowd barrier to where we needed them. At the moment, we've only got one dedicated forks driver on site, so he's a very, very popular man,

The rest of the morning was divided between crowd barrier and fixing the fence corner. It may seem early to fence in the Arena, but it's so central to the layout, it's really handy to have it visible in the centre of the showground. It's very big this year, 100 metres by 50, as it will be the target for paratroopers from the Princess Royal's on Monday.

The afternoon was taken up with a few fiddly jobs, adjusting the fence here and there, and that will go on for today, I expect.

We had another relaxed evening. Bungle had managed to sort my chair swivel problem (he hit with a big hammer, skilfully), so we've both got recliners again – many, many thanks, Bungle, you are a star!

Working at the Festival 2

16th August

Highlights from the last couple of days:

We had a party on the pontoon on Saturday evening, with much sharing of drinks, especially a range of whiskies, and later we made an outdoor buffet of the various dinners we'd cooked – three kinds of curry and some chilli from me, plus rice and cous cous.

Sadly, no one had a camera handy to record the invention of pole dancing, narrowboat style, using the tiller swan necks. An excellent evening, but a few sore heads yesterday morning!

We've put a lot of fence up, taken some of it down again and put it up elsewhere as the site team try to make the most of the terrain. It's much easier than last year – just a single skin, and a simple site perimeter.

The weather has been great, sunny some of the time, but not too hot to work, and we're quite optimistic about it for the next few days.

We've now got a socialising big gazebo up near the workers' boats, so we had our evening drink in there. Morale continues high.

Over the next couple of days we should see power start to appear as the gennies arrive and get hooked up. This will save having to run the boat engines every day, which will be good.

Working at the Festival 1

14th & 15th August

Sheila writes:

Bruce is still working on site so I shall have to do the blog today.

We had a very lazy start yesterday as we had promised to wait for Amber Moon so we could share the lock down onto the river. They wanted to get a last pump out before being on a Festival mooring for three weeks. It was a lovely morning with a fair amount of sun and not too much wind. When we eventually set off the locks were very busy but fortunately there was a lock keeper on duty. He was working both locks at once with a narrow boat and a cruiser in one and Amber Moon and ourselves in the other. This of course resulted in a little flotilla of boats all going down the river together.

Once heading up the Soar, this was one of the occasions when the GPS came in handy for boating. We knew that our mooring was in a little backwater on the left above the flood lock but we hadn't spotted the backwater when we came down in June. However Bruce who was steering said not to worry as he had it on the GPS. It's a very good mooring in a backwater that is big enough to have boats moored two abreast on one side and three abreast on the other with just nice room down the middle to get in and out.

We had been told that although the plan showed us moored with the bow into the backwater things had been changed and we should go in stern first. This makes sense because in an emergency it would be much easier to clear the boats out if they have their bows outermost. It just gave Bruce an interesting challenge to turn the boat in the river then back up the middle of the moorings. He was lucky that there were not too many boats in at that stage.

We got in to discover that Fair Fa' the boat on the pontoon inside us was already in place but Slow Gin who was to be between us had not yet arrived. The only problem was that Fair Fa' was moored bows in. Someone had told Pat and Sheila on Fair Fa' that we could only access our boat from the bow and so they had gone in bows first to allow us to come in stern first. Since we can of course access our boat from either end Pat decided to go out and turn. He was only just in time, by the time he got back in Slow Gin arrived and came in beside him. Then we could move into our position and we were in the right place and all facing the right way.

There followed a busy time saying hello to as many people as possible. There is so much catching up to do when we only see people once a year. It's all chaotic for the first few days as you start a conversation with someone then someone new comes along and you stop to greet them then the first person gets called away and you talk to the new arrival then someone new comes along and ... round it all goes again. Then you have to finish all the part conversations and remember what you have told to who and who has told you where they've been this year etc.

We returned briefly to the boat for lunch then reported to Sandy in Admin (well actually in her boat as the Admin office wasn't set up). We read the Health & Safety brief and were issued with our wristbands. Until you've got your wristband you can't go on site. Duly processed we joined the fencing team and in the course of the afternoon half a dozen stalwarts erected a fence round the wrg site and the Tardis compound so that all the equipment that has arrived already would be secure overnight. The grass in the Festival field and the wrg/Tardis compound had been cut the day before. The camping field is still being mown, a big job as the camping field and the car parks are very large this year.

Today has been great weather for our purpose. The wind has been drying the ground well and although there have been nice sunny spells it has not been too hot. An enlarged fencing team has in one day put a fence round the entire perimeter of the festival site and fenced in a special compound for the security team. They like their compound well fenced to make them feel safe!

To Sawley

12th & 13th August

The mooring by bridge 25 was very pleasant, with a great view over a flooded gravel pit towards the river, but was quite noisy since the A50 was well within earshot. On a damp morning yesterday, we set off for the run to Swarkestone and had uneventful boating to Stenson lock, stopping briefly in Willington for a final bit of shopping.

Stenson lock is one of the most challenging on the system, because it is deep and both the ground paddles and gate paddles cause substantial turbulence. When we arrived it was just being filled to take a BW workboat and a hire boat from Sileby Mill. There was a single privateer waiting to come up and even with Sheila's help they found it very difficult. It was by now raining steadily and this may explain why I began to feel rather grumpy. Sheila tells me that this was uncalled for and I guess I ought to be more understanding at times about novice boaters.

Swarkestone was reached just before lunch and we tied on the towpath to the west of the remains of the stop lock, so as to be able to use the water point before setting off this morning. Since we'd finished boating, the weather now improved substantially. The afternoon was spent in our usual way, and we ran a wash load as part of the drive to get on top of as many domestic chores as possible so as to be free to concentrate on work next week.

Sheila also managed to finish her crochet order, and took advantage of a fast internet connection to find some alternative patterns to try out.

As planned, we refilled the water tank first thing and were on our way by eight o' clock. At Weston Lock we caught up with Don on Bluebell. Don is another of the Festival chippies and we stayed with him all the way down to Sawley. It was a great morning for boating and once more we arrived at our destination just before lunch. Here we found Bob and Annie Mayall, chief plumber and personnel manager respectively (not that they get much respect from us – that would be pampering them) on their boat Amber Moon.

Don stopped just long enough to get a pump out and to have a chat with Bob and Annie, then carried on to Redhill. It's worth noting that the pump out arrangement here is very good. For £12 they give you the key to the machine and you can take as long as you need to empty your tank.

After lunch we had a look round the Sawley Marina chandlery, but their selection of fuel filters, and indeed of filters in general, was really very restricted considering what a large captive market they have in the marina.

The weather has continued very fine and we are hoping that it remains so. We've run the final washload this afternoon and will top the water tank up yet again before leaving. The Mayalls are planning to pump out Amber Moon tomorrow morning, so we'll hang about until they've finished and then go down the river with them.

As last year, we'll do our best to post here over the next three weeks, but don't be surprised if things become a little irregular in view of the other demands on our time.

Heading for the National

10th & 11th August

After the meteorological splendours of the weekend, it was a damp start yesterday morning, although the rain was never very heavy. Since Sheila's sore eye, though improved, was not fully recovered after two weeks treatment, she again presented herself on the doorstep of the surgery at a quarter past eight.

Meantime, I made my way to the butchers and bought a stock of meat to see us through the next ten days or so, after which we will be being fed on the wrg camp. Back at the boat, I had just finished stowing the meat away in the freezer when Pat Barton's boat, Quercus, came past.

Pat was not, however, steering. Instead another blueshirt stalwart, Kevin, was on the back. I popped out to give him and his partner a hand down the lock and we had a brief exchange of news.

Whilst this was going on, Sheila came back from a successful consultation and we were soon able to set off in our turn. Since it was still before nine, the pharmacy was not yet open and we decided to get her prescription filled at the fancy new pharmacy in Branston village.

We stopped on the water point to fill up and then had another steady run down to the moorings at Branston Water Park, at which we arrived just a bit after twelve. As forecast, the weather remained damp and it became rather clammy as the morning went on, sufficiently so that we made ourselves mugs of instant soup to go with lunch.

In the afternoon, Sheila walked through to the village to get her new eye drops and the rest of the day was spent in the boat, opening the doors and side hatches during the brief periods of sun, and closing them again as the next burst of rain swept through.

We managed to get some catching up done and the Braidbar Owners' quiz is very nearly complete.

The weather today began rather cloudy but improved steadily as the day went on, and as I write this it's gloriously sunny. We timed our departure from Branston to arrive on the Morrison's mooring just after eight, and by nine were back on the boat laden down with supplies. Then it was on to Shobnall Marina, where we got diesel and a pump out and I obtained a refund on the fuel filter. They had managed to obtain an engine alternator drive belt for me for the reasonable price of £5.75.

There was another brief scrum as Sheila reversed Sanity out of the marina, made more interesting by the fact that the crew of the hire boat waiting to come in didn't understand that Sanity needed to be well clear of the turning area before they could swing their boat round to slot it in under the towpath bridge.

We crossed with Ami Bovard at Dallow Lane Lock and then had a comparatively uneventful run to bridge 25. There was a good deal of traffic on the cut, mind you, and Sheila's boat handling skills were put to the test from time to time at bridge holes and narrows. Bridge 25 is about half way between Egginton Wharf and Willington and there is a useful length of piling just to the West of it, overlooking some gravel pits. Here we've spent a very relaxed afternoon sitting in the sun.

Tomorrow we will carry on to Swarkestone, probably with a brief pause at Willington to buy a paper and possibly some more bottles of red wine. We did so much other shopping at Morrisons we couldn't have carried any more back with us and we're down to our last two bottles.

A sunny weekend

8th & 9th August

The night before last was one of those hot and sticky ones which really disrupts your sleep. We made an early start as a result and set off to do our geocaching while it was still comparatively cool.

We started by finding the cache which had been missing the day before, thus being the First To Find the new version of the cache. On our way back past the moorings above Shade House Lock we got into conversation with the folk on Recycled Teenagers, whom we had last seen at a Save Our Waterways meeting at Huddlesford Junction.

This meant it was rather later than we'd planned when we set off along the Coventry Canal to find a series of five caches around Fradley village. The day before, we'd ordered an Independent at the boatyard shop, and we picked it up as we went by. We had another successful hunt, although one of the caches was again apparently missing on our way out. On the way back, however, the GPS indicated a different tree as the location and we found the cache easily.

We were glad to get back to the boat and put our feet up in the heat of the day. It was very pleasant to sit in the bow and watch the world go by. It being Saturday, there was an awful lot of world going by, and Sheila fielded many admiring remarks about her crochet.

When we'd got back to the boat it was the only one left on the moorings, but by mid afternoon there was no space left. By six o'clock boats were moored on all possible locations including the lock landings, and more were arriving with expressions of dismay.

Many of these were Shakespeare hire boats from their new base at Mercia Marine near Willington. The question of the amount of training a hire crew should receive is a vexed one. I know from my acquaintance with the relevant research that people only remember about half to three quarters of what their doctor tells them during a GP consultation, so I can well believe that hire crews are told a great deal more than they absorb during handover. But it would seem a good idea, especially at the height of the season, if they were warned about the difficulty of finding moorings at the end of the day at honeypot sites such as Fradley.

Meanwhile, it was the privateer tied behind us who showed the poorest behaviour that we have encountered for a while. I don't have a problem with people having a beer and a jolly time with their mates on a warm summer's evening, far from it, but providing backing music for the entire moorings from your iPod driven speaker system is thoughtless. Even Sheila, who is quite fond of Jim Reeves and other music of that kind, found it a bit much.

They eventually retired inside at ten o' clock and we went off to bed. Once again it was a hot night, so we slept with the Houdini open, and were therefore startled into wakefulness at half one by the terrier from the boat behind barking to be let back on the boat.

Not only that, it was a good five minutes before he succeeded in attracting attention (there must have been a lot of that beer) and it made it very difficult to get back to sleep. We hadn't set an alarm (we seldom do) but didn't need one this morning as the dog was barking again at around six. Presumably they had let it out to do its business unsupervised.

So – if you find yourself tied near a 55 foot mid blue Springer called Early Doors, my advice is move, no matter how late it is or how difficult it will be to find another mooring.

We did manage to doze for a bit longer before getting a cup of tea. We needed to refill the water tank, which was best done first thing whilst there was still a decent pressure in the tap. But we didn't want to set off for Alrewas until about nine o'clock, so having drunk our tea and got dressed, we shafted the boat silently straight across to the water point and ate breakfast whilst the hose was running.

Tank full, we shafted Sanity back again and had a quick natter with the guy on the boat in front of us whilst waiting to set off. We were just about to do so when Dave Venn on Daizey V came down Junction Lock and tied on the water point. Dave is the Health and Safety officer at the National Festival and we had a quick natter with him before setting off.

Our timing must have been right because we had a very straightforward run down to Alrewas, crossing with a boat at each lock but never having to queue. There was plenty of room above Bagnall Lock, so we've tied here for the night. It has meant that we have been able to run the engine to do two loads of washing without worrying about disturbing the Sunday peace of the village.

Dave subsequently came past; he's trying to get a day ahead of us as he wants to arrive at the site on Thursday rather than Friday.

We've had another idyllic afternoon, reading the paper, doing crochet, and a bit more work on the quiz. The weather forecast's not quite so good for the rest of the week, but hopefully we'll see only a little light rain.

Tomorrow we'll go on down to Branston and then there will be a busy day on Tuesday, taking advantage of the last supermarket we pass, and getting diesel and a pump out at Shobnall before ending the day near Willington.

Wasps are a pain in the neck

6th & 7th August

We actually managed to sleep in yesterday morning, and didn't wake up until nearly seven o' clock. We weren't in a hurry anyway, and after a relaxed start boated to Rugeley. We still got there a bit early and had to hunt about a bit to find a mooring. After a good restock at Morrisons' and Wilkinson's, we ambled on, Sheila steering whilst I stowed the groceries in the galley.

After that I spent a good deal of my time being a lookout on the bow as we negotiated the various narrows through Armitage and Handsacre. We managed this without any drama, but I'm sorry to say that an Ownerships boat that we passed responded to my call of "There's another boat behind us" by opening his throttle, whereupon there was an interesting encounter in the bridge hole we had just cleared.

We tied on the towpath on the Handsacre side of bridge 56, driving all three of our big mooring pins well in. It was a good job that we did so, as the rest of the day was enlivened by boats charging past in both directions.

In the afternoon I worked on the quiz for a bit (I see we've had just one attempt to answer last time's puzzler) and Sheila made the most of what sun there was sitting out on the bow and pressing on with her crochet.

Odd event of the day was a middle aged man walking past looking a little confused. He asked us to confirm that if he turned left "a bit further along up here", he would eventually reach Birmingham. It seems that he had taken the wrong turning further back, presumably at Fradley. We agreed that he was in theory correct but tried to warn him that he was taking a very long way round. Apparently unfazed, he strode off along the towpath and we saw no more of him.

This morning (Friday) we didn't want to make an early start, as we planned to moor at Fradley and so wanted to get there between ten and eleven. Naturally, we woke really early but at least had time to do some internet stuff before setting off. The run would have been absolutely idyllic on a sunny summers morning, were it not for the fact that a wasp got between my collar and neck as I was steering and expressed its discomfort by stinging me. I went to brush it off, it got caught in the chain for my MedicAlert dog tag and stung me again, this time leaving its sting behind.

Though I say it myself, my language was really remarkably restrained. Sheila took over steering whilst I went and found a pair of tweezers and some hydrocortisone ointment, then I took the tiller back whilst she removed the sting and applied the ointment. There don't seem to have been any serious consequences of this, though of course I felt a bit shocked for a while and my neck is still rather sore some hours later.

We had a steady run down Fradley flight, arriving on the visitor moorings at about half ten when there was indeed plenty of choice. On the way down the locks we had a chance for a brief chat with Doug and Anne on Zoria with whom we'd shared a New Year's Eve celebration three years ago. In the intervening period, Graeme and Cathy, who were with us that year, have produced two children.

It all goes to show the nature of friendships in the linear village that is the Inland Waterways. You can meet someone for a few days, not see them for years, and then pick up again where you left off when your tracks happen to cross again.

After we'd moored and had a cup of coffee, I walked on down into Alrewas to collect a prescription from the pharmacy that I'd ordered by post earlier this week, and took the opportunity to buy a newspaper and a loaf of bread.

Whilst I was away, Sheila witnessed more evidence of the moral turpitude of the Mallard Duck. We are used to them knocking seven bells out of each other over a few scraps of bread, and engaging in more open air sex than you would see on the island of Crete this month, but this went beyond all that. A dead duck chick came floating past the boat and Sheila saw one of the adult ducks doing its best to eat it.

After lunch we set out to do some more of the geocaches which are liberally sprinkled around the area. These ones were back up the flight and past Wood End Lock. We couldn't find the first one, either on the way out or on the way back, though we braved ferocious nettles and brambles in our search.

Back at the boat I logged the results on the geocaching website. Because I'm a bit late posting this blog, I'm able to report the follow up straight away, which is that the cache owner investigated, found that it was indeed missing and replaced it.

Feeling pleasantly weary, we settle into the boat to rehydrate and catch up with various jobs including this blog. We were in the middle of this when Elanor turned up with our post. She suggested that by way of celebration for the start of her summer holiday, she take us out for a meal.

After taking just a little time for basic titivation (the Swan after all is a boaters' pub) we abandoned what we were doing and went off with her.

We had the usual basic but well cooked and good value meal, which made an extremely pleasant end to a largely enjoyable day, if one disregards the attentions of Vespula vulgaris.

Heading back to Rugeley

4th & 5th August

After I'd posted last time, we discovered a down side to the mooring just to the north of Acton Trussell. I don't know whether there was a herd of cows nearby, or whether it was just the consequence of continuing warm, damp weather, but we were plagued by flies that evening, and the fly swat had to be wielded with skill and vigour to keep them under control. It didn't help that the weather took on a pattern of showers with quite pleasant interludes, so that we kept opening the bow doors and side hatches and then closing them again after a new battalion of flies had entered.

We used to use one of those electric tennis racket type high tech fly swats, but in the confines of the boat it seemed quite large and clumsy, and a 50p basic fly swat from Aldi now meets our needs. It helps to know that flies can't see behind them, so the trick is to bring the swat down through that blind spot.

We made a prompt start yesterday morning in pleasant enough weather and were soon working down Deptmore Lock. Out of curiosity, I timed us through the lock, which took ten minutes from start to finish, as opposed to the fifty it had taken coming the other way on a busy Saturday.

Although the water tank was still half full, we decided to water again at Milford Wharf, so as to save complex manoeuvring at Great Haywood. Accordingly, we tied once more on the rather broken bank next to the underpass beneath the West Coast Main Line. Having got Sanity settled, I got the hose out and handed it to Sheila who was standing on the bank. As she turned round, we both realised what was missing from the scene. The water point which we had used just three days before was no longer there; indeed it was hard to tell where it had been, since the area beneath its former location was covered in woodchip.

To be fair, it was always a slightly odd water point, consisting as it did of a tap inside an ammunition box fixed to the stone facing of the railway embankment and secured shut with a length of chain and a BW padlock. There was, however, a sign saying "Mooring for water point only" together with another pleading with dog owners not to let their animals foul the area. Both of these signs have also disappeared, to be replaced by quantities of dog poo.

I'd always assumed that the tap was primarily for the benefit of the Milford Wharf moorers; perhaps they are to have water supplied directly to the moorings in future.

Disappointed and just a little surprised, we plodded on over the Sow aqueduct and down Tixall Lock. Tixall Wide had ample choice of mooring, again in marked contrast to the weekend before. As soon as we'd tied up, Sheila found herself engaged in technical discussions with two women from other boats about her port hole doilies and the TripleFlex synthetic whalebone with which we mount them in the portholes.

It was one of those off and on discussions where people went away and told their friends and the friends then showed up at the side hatches with further questions. It was just about petering out when Jo and then Keith from Hadar showed up for a natter. We'd been discussing whether the boat we could see arriving further back down the wide was Hadar so we were not entirely surprised when they turned up.

Since it kept trying to rain on us, we retreated to the cabin for cups of coffee and a thorough catching up session. They'd had a good Canalway Cavalcade, and told us that they are likely to be trading on the Leicester Section next winter.

After they'd gone I popped into Great Haywood for a newspaper and some pasties to eke out the bread supply from the day before.

Since the weather continued damp, we had another afternoon of lurking in the cabin. Sheila is still producing crochet as fast as she can, and we did some more work on the quiz for the Braidbar Owners' weekend. It's very nearly finished; the main need now is to sort out the images for the picture round.

I've also decided not to use a question I was quite looking forward to, as I couldn't find independent verification of the answer from any of my sources. The question was going to be "If the M in MG stands for Morris, what does the R in PRM stand for?"

I'll leave this one as an exercise for the reader.

We made an early start today as we now needed to water at Great Haywood and then work down Haywood and Colwich locks before they got busy. Sheila steered along the rump of the Staffs and Worcs while I ate breakfast and then took over on the helm. Fortunately, it was a flat calm and since it was not yet seven o'clock there were no gongoozlers about. Under these circumstances I did a perfect reverse turn onto the water point. Sheila ate her breakfast while the tank was filling, and I got rid of the rubbish and recycling.

Then we went merrily on, having Haywood to ourselves and crossing with an Anglo Welsh hire boat at Colwich. We've tied just beyond bridge 69 between Wolseley Bridge and Rugeley and had finished the day's boating just after half nine. The batteries not being fully charged, we ran a wash load straightaway whilst I checked for local geocaches.

There was one back toward Wolseley Bridge, so once the socks were washed we set off to find it. As a result we found a curious brick tunnel with a blind end between the river and the canal. It's not mentioned in any of the guides as far as I know, and it's hard to know what can have been its original purpose.

Having succeeded in finding the cache, we carried on back to Wolseley Bridge and then walked up the road away from the canal and river to the service station which is also a Post Office and general store. There we were able to buy a copy of The Independent before heading back to Sanity to lunch off some baguettes I had baked earlier.

The weather has steadily improved this afternoon and is now very pleasant. It took a real effort of will to come in from dozing on the bow to write this blog post.

Penkridge for the fun of it

2nd & 3rd August

The last two days have seen us go to Penkridge and back just for the fun of it, and it certainly was. We made a prompt start yesterday but still found ourselves in a moderate amount of traffic all the way to Penkridge. There were, however, no fishermen about, though this will certainly not be the case next Saturday, during the National Fishing Competition.

Progress was reasonably steady and after a couple of hours we were tied on our usual towpath mooring below Penkridge lock. As we were getting Sanity settled down, a chap came out of his garden gate and had a natter with Sheila, having recognised Sanity from when we were last here during the winter.

It was too soon to go shopping, so Sheila spent some time titivating the floral displays whilst I took advantage of a fast and stable internet connection.

We then walked down to the village centre and stocked up at the Co-op. We've started trying to build up stocks, as after we have left Burton we will have to go for ten days without being able to shop in a supermarket, and indeed it's not clear how much shopping of any kind we'll be able to do from Redhill in the first week. After that we will be eating with the wrgies and the only challenge will be to ensure we have sufficient alcoholic refreshment in stock.

This assumes, of course, that we make it to Redhill. According to the towpath telegraph, the Alrewas river section is in the yellow, caution mode, and both the Upper Trent and the River Soar are closed. The status of both of these changes quite quickly, so we must just hope we don't see too much rain in the next ten days.

The rest of Sunday passed very pleasantly. For much of the time it was fine enough to sit out on the bow; Sheila got her usual steady stream of admiring remarks from passers by as she continued to work on her crochet.

Today, we made a leisurely start as we wanted to do another shopping trip, and in any event only planned to reverse yesterday's boating. We had another good session in the Co-op and then went round to the baker's for a loaf of bread. Sadly, this baker doesn't believe in early morning starts and no fresh loaves were to be available much before ten o' clock. We then remembered that we had had this problem before.

I called in to the Co-op again to get some bread there and then caught up with Sheila on the way back to Sanity.

Then the fun began again. We needed to lock up to use the winding hole, and found there was already a queue waiting to come down. As I started Sanity turning into the winding hole, another boat appeared in the distance and had to hover as I completed the manoeuvre. We were third in the queue to lock back down and this pattern continued through Longford, Park Gate and Shutt Hill locks.

The boat crews were a mixed bunch, both in terms of skill and good manners. Some were very reluctant to leave their boats and help with the lock, whilst others, like ourselves, chose to send all available spare crew along to help speed the operation.

We'd planned to call in at Midland Chandlers to see if they had the right fuel filter and a battery top up device, but under the circumstances decided not to bother. Last time we were in there they couldn't identify which of their filters was the right one, and if they had the ingenious device for topping up batteries, I reckon I would have spotted it and bought it by now,

We got through Acton Trussell by just after twelve and have moored on a nice spot on the towpath just beyond. I topped up the batteries using my trusty bottle and funnel, and Sheila gave the flowers on the roof another going over and gave them a feed of Baby Bio.

Tomorrow we'll probably go back to Tixall and then gently wend our way south once more.

Loafing and ambling towards Penkridge

31st July & 1st August

Yesterday was a day to catch up with ourselves after the excitements of the week. We stayed where we were on Tixall Wide, making a leisurely start to the day after a good night's sleep. The weather was fine and bright at first but it soon reverted to this summer's disappointing pattern of gusty wind and cool showers.

I plodded into Great Haywood to post the pension application and to get a paper, but otherwise we spent the rest of the day lurking in the boat.

A fair bit of time was spent on the internet by one, the other or both of us. The most visible evidence of this is a long post on the Building Sanity Again blog describing our meeting with Peter Mason. We were also taking advantage of a fast connection to research such matters as the additional cost of double glazed portholes (£20 a time, more or less).

In the evening Elanor took advantage of our continuing proximity to Burton on Trent to come for dinner and stayed for much of the evening. It was particularly good to see her since she will be away on a wrg camp when we come back through Burton next weekend.

This morning it was raining again. I made yet another trip into Great Haywood for bread and the paper, then we set off for a run to Penkridge over the next couple of days, just for the sake of the boating. The fact that we are doing so demonstrates an important point about the nature of our continuous cruising.

If we lived on the boat solely because it is a cheap lifestyle and so allowed us to retire early, we would have stayed put at Tixall for the next few days. It isn't a restricted mooring and we could always have nipped back to Great Haywood if we needed to fill the water tank. As it is, because we live on the boat in order to do as much boating as possible, we've chosen to move on.

Actually, we must really be dedicated boaters, because conditions today were far from ideal. It rained most of the time, we stopped to water at Milford Wharf and had the usual struggle to tie the boat there, and we got mixed up with a convoy of boats from the Watch House Cruising Club on the Bridgewater Canal.

Furthermore, about half the total length of towpath from Milford, round the south of Stafford, to the Hazelstrine Bridge at Stafford Boat Club was occupied by dedicated anglers.

When we got to Deptmore Lock, there were several boats waiting to go up and several more arrived behind whilst we were queuing. Because Deptmore is very deep, it's slow to turn round and it took us fifty minutes to get through the lock.

We've stopped on the towpath just beyond and have spent the afternoon largely relaxing in the boat, attempting the various quizzes in the Saturday Independent and doing this blog. (Sheila points out that she has been gainfully employed on the current crochet order, which is just as well as she has just had another enquiry. Since Sanity Again with have fourteen portholes, it's clearly going to be a while before she gets a break from making her decorative doilies.)

The afternoon is cold and clammy enough that we've put the central heating on. If the weather doesn't improve soon, I'm going to buy a bag of coal and relight the stove.