Walking then boating exercise

20th & 21st April

It’s been a busy couple of days, first doing the village walk yesterday, and then some boating today. In addition, I had a fasting blood test just after nine yesterday; I came out of the surgery and ravenously ripped open the chewy bar in my pocket. Still at least it meant that I had a late breakfast, which was just as well, as the walk proved hard work for some reason.

I’m really not sure quite why this was; it wasn’t as long as the ones we were doing around Lyme Park last month, and we weren’t going particularly fast. At least it made the meal in the George and Dragon all the more welcome.

The George really is the place for a pub meal in Alrewas these days. The Indian by Bagnall Lock has renamed itself the Jaipur Cottage, but Will Chapman tells us that the staff and the food are much the same as before. The William IV has abandoned its pretensions to haute cuisine, but is now the youngsters boozing pub, and the Crown is sadly likely to close when the landlord’s lease runs out, as he can’t make it turn a profit.

Elanor made contact with us just as we got back to the pub, and brought some post. After a good lunch, we wandered back to the boat and relaxed for the rest of the afternoon.

Today was an early start – down to the water point as the tank was in its last quarter, and then on to Burton for a pump out and diesel. We got to the Morrison’s mooring just at lunch time, after a pleasant run with a fair amount of traffic about. The weather was sunny, but still with a cold wind, which was fine for me as I was lockwheeling, but less fun for Sheila standing on the back.

I took over for the final run to Shobnall, and managed to turn Sanity Again into the narrow opening without much trouble. It’s very reassuring that the extra 10 feet doesn’t cause a lot of difficulty in manoeuvring; the main problem tends to be that you need to put one end or the other into water that doesn’t otherwise get used much, and is rather shallow.

With toilet tank empty and diesel tank nearly full (at 83 pence per litre at the domestic rate, I wasn’t too worried about filling up the the brim), we backed out and tied on the towpath just outside. Then we popped back into the chandlery for some bits and pieces, like oil to do Sanity’s last service (as far as we are concerned, that is) and some Odorloss toilet fluid for Sanity Again.

Tomorrow, we’ll take a walk into town, then amble back to the Branston Water park moorings for the night.