Short run to Hillmorton and a bit of hard work

…for once, I know. It's a disgrace, our leisurely lifestyle, but we don't care.

/wahaha

First off a big hello to the chap off Saunter Together, who said as he walked past our mooring at around eight "Don't claim a six o'clock start this morning!". It transpired that yesterday he'd noticed our ad for the ebooks in the porthole, looked us up on the web and discovered this blog.

It is good to meet other boaters though my maunderings here.

Not long after we'd chatted to him we set off for our run to the foot of Hillmorton, arriving a bit sooner than we'd planned after just 90 minutes. It didn't matter, there was a load of space before the bend, as usual. CRT are busy extending the piling what's more, so it'll be even easier to get in here this year.

On the way we passed Waiouru at Brownsover and had a brief exchange of hellos with Tom Jones. He reckons they'll be catching us up soon, so we'll finally get a chance to have a chat instead of just exchanging remarks on each others' blogs.

Less good was the apparently injured juvenile swan we saw on the aqueduct over the River Avon. It was writhing around a bit and walking even more awkwardly than swans usually do on dry land. I gave the RSPCA a call to report it.

I've learnt a new word from the World Wide Words website today: Palpebrous. It means having prominent eyebrows, which in turn means me.

We were all sorted and cup of coffee drunk by half ten, so we turned to and washed and rinsed the starboard side of the cabin before lunch. This is one of the last opportunities we'll have to do that as the towpath will be on the other side for most of the rest of the trip.

After lunch we stirred ourselves again and polished what we'd washed as well as the bow flashes and the slide at the stern.

We are now possessed of a strong feeling of achievement.

We're also knackered.

/blur

Fellow Braidbar Owners Derek and Eleanor are heading our way, moving their boat Mi Amigo to Crick where she'll be available to view as they'll be selling her at the end of this month. When they get here we'll give them a hand up the locks; they need to be in Braunston tonight for family reasons.

(later) As I was editing this, they showed up and we did indeed see them up the locks. Mi Amigo's details are on the Braidbar website here.