Onward

The towpath in Hopwas is well used by the local populace and we had to clear it of some doggy doo yesterday to avoid the risk of treading it into the boat. But it's good to see the waterway giving pleasure to others beside us boaters. It was a quiet night and an early start this morning. I don't turn on the 3 phone to provide internet access in these circumstances, so that we're not tempted to loaf too long abed.

Instead, I put Radio 4 on, even though that meant listening to that strange programme Something Understood which today, however, was about humour so had a few entertaining clips at least. It was followed by that excellent presenter Cas Graham interviewing a tweeting shepherd in Cumbria, would you believe.

Off we went just after seven, chugging through the village and on to Fazeley. There was a boat on the service wharf when we got there, but they were happy for us to breast up alongside them to get rid of our rubbish and recycling. They followed us to the foot of Glascote and on through Amington, Alvecote and Polesworth. We crossed with one boat in the locks and had to idle past many others on the towpath after Alvecote, all spread out as they were.

No reason why they shouldn't be, of course, but a shame as the water is quite deep along there and it is otherwise a chance to wind the engine up a bit. This stretch is always a bit of a problem for me with earworms, as I suspect I've mentioned before. First there's Nellie on the offside in Amington, so that my mind is full of Nellie the Elephant for a bit, with its association for me of CPR training as it's one of the tunes that gives you the right rhythm for chest compressions.

That's then replaced by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap when we pass Will Power in Polesworth.

After lunch, I lifted the engine boards to check the state of water and oil in the engine (both fine) and to measure the individual voltages of the batteries in the domestic bank. It's not really practical to do this thoroughly on the towpath as you should really disconnect the lot for half an hour, but I isolated each in turn and found that they all had the same voltage, making it very unlikely that any of them have a seriously failing cell.

Maintenance duty done, I've been loafing for the rest of the afternoon with a clear conscience. Tomorrow, up Atherstone, stopping half way up to do some fresh food shopping at Aldi, then on towards Hartshill. It looks as if the brief spell of fine weather isn't going to last, sadly, with a return of rain and wind later in the week, but we can always hope that that will have changed by the time we get there...