Summer socializing

Must say, the social life whilst on the K&A has been quite exceptional, and looks likely to remain so for a bit yet. Partly, that’s a matter of it being summer, and of us meeting folk who, like us, are pottering about before foregathering at the National site at Beale Park next month.

We had, as I tweeted, an excellent session with Derek and Sheila Mills of Clarence yesterday afternoon. Derek had passed on some useful tips about Hurricane installation during the build of Sanity Again, and it was good to meet up, show off the new boat and partake of a modest drink or two with them.

No sooner had they gone, and I had turned my attention to making dinner, than Colin and Jane from Slow Gin knocked on the roof. They fall into this category of pottering blue shirts; they’re liveaboards, with a permanent mooring near Newbold on Avon, and were out for their summer’s cruise and taking in the K&A.

We put them off for a half hour so’s we could get something to eat, then gave them the guided tour and shared a few more potations. They’ve also presented us with a bottle of Slow Gin’s sloe gin, a nice prospect for us.

It meant a bit of a late night by our standards, and we had to show determination to get going early this morning, but we did it, moving down to the water point at half six, and refilling the tank whilst eating breakfast.

We had a pleasant run down to Newbury, taking just on three hours for the seven locks and handful of miles. We shared the final few locks with a family on an ex-Reading Marine hire boat (now operated by ABC), which made for sociable boating.

At half ten, there were good spaces at the visitor moorings between the swing bridge and the lock, where we’ve been for the rest of the day, shopping and pottering on board.

An early night tonight methinks, before the run to Woolhampton tomorrow, and our rendezvous with Graham and Brenda Keens.

Two hot days boating

Just like last year, we're certainly having some decent summer weather in June; both yesterday and today we started boating at seven, and today we managed to stop by mid morning.

Yesterday got a bit out of hand; we arrived in Newbury at eleven, and went into the main shopping area before lunch. I’d planned to go into the Vodafone shop to see about a new phone and contract, but quickly realised that I wasn’t in a fit state to cope with the hassle, being hot, hungry and tired after a short night the night before.

We’d had a very pleasant evening in the Rowbarge Inn with Gill and Peter off Cala, but all day we paid the price of a late night and early start.

Nonetheless, it’s worth noting that Newbury has made a good job of its canal side. Like Alan and Dot from Priston, we didn’t fancy spending Friday night in a town, so we boated on into the countryside, finding a very basic mooring on the towpath above Higg's Lock.

You can’t get away from the railway on this stretch, which kept Sheila awake for a bit, but not your correspondent.

As we’d been told, once above Newbury, things start to improve a bit with regard to the ease of navigation; the good news is that BW have announced that they should be able to reopen Caen Hill on 9 July, though this will probably be too late for us. No firm decisions yet.

My remarks about the funding crisis has started an interesting debate going on the canals list, with most in favour of avoiding any closures. I can see the arguments against such a move, of course, but I do think we have to get our heads round the fact that there’s going to be a much worse funding shortfall than the one we’ve got at the moment, and something has to give.

The very valid point has been made that the Lottery funding which was used for restorations on both this and the Pennine canals means that if BW closed them again, they’d have to repay the grants, making closure more expensive than struggling on.

These are 48 hour moorings in Kintbury, so we’re going to take advantage of them and have a day off from boating tomorrow. We’re off to the Dundas Arms with Alan and Dorothy tonight, and entertaining Mel and Bungle from WRG tomorrow.