To Sharpness and back

11th & 12th July

Yesterday was the first day for ages on which we made a seriously lazy start, not rising until Terry Wogan was in full flow, and connecting to the water point alongside the mooring to top up before setting off for Sharpness in leisurely fashion. We got there after about an hour's steady boating – this canal, like all others, is not as deep as it should be, but it's supposed to be 15 feet deep, so there's still plenty for Sanity to swim in.

Sharpness proved to be more rural than we'd expected – the moorings are on the end of the canal proper, and the industrial stuff around the port is mostly hidden. We found Nackered Navvy, Wild Otter, Lady Hannah, Chesterton and Canny all ensconced on the towpath. Seemingly they'd been into the Dockers' Club for a meal last night, which was very good as regards quality and quantity, but some of them had had to wait an hour and a half to be served.

The answer, apparently, is not to go there in a big party. We had conflicting advice from their crews about the availability of supplies, so I set to and baked some rolls for lunch.

They all set off back in the course of the morning, leaving us with just a couple of longer term moored boats, but it was a nice day, and we had a good view over the towpath wall to the estuary, so we weren't too upset.

After lunch we took a walk around the end of the canal – it's well worth visiting the place, and I took yet more photos which will have to wait for a better connection before you can see them. There is indeed a small basic shop in the angle between the two arms of the canal, but it's no longer a Post Office, having been the victim of the current slaughter of small POs by this government.

Today we slept in again, but made an effort and were boating by eight. The weather is showing a slow improvement, being showery and mild, with not too much wind. In what seemed very little time we were back at Fretherne Bridge, closest approach to Frampton, where I got a paper and some more bread.

Being Saturday, there's a bit more activity on the canal, but it's still very quiet compared to the Midlands mayhem. On arrival at Saul, we found ourselves fourth in the queue for the pump out, but since it was barely gone ten, we were not bothered.

The pump out proved to be all that it had been cracked up to be, very powerful, and with a good length of time for your tenner. In addition, the pause option doesn't time out, so there's a good chance of being able to use the tail end of someone else's time before you have to put in your own card.

Having given the tank a good rinse and seen the green light shining on the gauge again, we untied and headed for a mooring just the other side of the Junction Bridge.

The red light did not change to green after the bridge had swung, however, and the reason quickly became apparent as the faux paddle wheeler, the Oliver Cromwell, hove into view.

Needless to say, the wind promptly came up, giving me some problems in hovering Sanity out of the way, but we made it and finally got through to tie just beyond the Wycliffe Sculling Club.

We've had a quiet afternoon, sorting out the plants on the roof (the bay tree has been attacked by leaf rolling caterpillars, for heaven's sake), doing what we can on the net, though the connection here is worse than ever, and waiting for Elanor to turn up with our post.

Tomorrow, we plan to go as far as Quedgeley, then on into Gloucester on Monday morning to meet my sister Jane.

Life on camp V, and back to boating

8th, 9th & 10th July

This is a transitional post between finishing wrg camp mode and getting back into cruising mode, so it may feel a bit disjointed, not least because I'm still recovering from the last big push.

Tuesday we spent chasing around trying to get all our stuff done on site whilst we still had folks around to do it. It has to be said that Cotswold Canal Trust's attitude to the wrgies didn't help. Their purchasing manager made a number of decisions which substantially complicated our task, and indeed left us feeling quite unloved.

For example, he authorised the removal of the shower block on Monday night, when we still had the best part of two days to go on a site which was by then a mud bath. Only Bungle's energetic and assertive intervention got us one back. Similarly, the accommodation marquee was supposed to be there until Wednesday morning, but was taken away during Tuesday, the tables and chairs we were eating off having gone the day before.

The final phases of a festival camp are always a bit tricky, as you pack away the stuff you've been relying on to do the job, but the poor logistics of this one just drove us spare. It's to be hoped that they find a more competent person to do the purchasing next time. Our mood wasn't helped by the signs which were all over the site during the Festival, that it was run "entirely by Cotswold Canal Trust volunteers".

So what were all these red shirts doing around the place then?

Anyway, enough moaning – I just want to show that it's not all hunky dory at these things, not that anyone with experience of working with volunteers would expect it to be, I guess. We had a final meal in a Chinese restaurant, as we no longer had any means of cooking one on site, and it made a great end of camp occasion.

Yesterday we had a final final half day on site, chasing round loading stuff and putting things away in the two freight containers CCT keeps at Saul. After lunch we let go from the mooring we'd been using for a bit over a week, and went back to Gloucester to get water, and do some shopping this morning. We didn't bother going through Llanthony Bridge into the dock itself, as there's a water point just outside, and some 48 hour moorings on a pontoon there.

Having shopped to restock with perishables first thing today, we were most of the way back to the boat when I suggested we get a pump out card to work the BW pump out machine at Saul, available from the BW offices at Gloucester.

"Good idea" says Sheila, "I'll take most of the shopping back to the boat, you nip in and get the card."

I soon discovered that although the Harbour Office building has a huge BRITISH WATERWAYS painted on its side, it is no longer the BW office, which is diametrically opposite, near the narrowboat pontoons. So I plodded round there, loaded daysack on my back, eventually found the office and got the card.

The River Severn is very high at the moment, so we were glad we'd planned to go back the length of the canal to Sharpness before attempting the river passage to Worcester. In fact, as we boated along this morning, we decided that it will be better to stay a few more days down here, and give the river a chance to settle down.

My sister Jane is due to join us for three days on Monday, and we'd thought to get her to meet us in Worcester so that we could show her some narrow canal boating, but it's going to make more sense to ask her to come to Gloucester and see the Ship Canal and the Docks.

We had a bit of a problem on arrival back at Saul. Normally the bridge keepers are very good, and start swinging the bridge as soon as they are sure that you want to go through. This means that you boat confidently up to the bridge, slowing a bit if you realise the guy is mowing the grass or something and has to get back to his office, and the bridge swings in nice time for you to slip through.

This time, nothing happened, and, as we got close, it became apparent that they were testing the gates they can use to close the canal if there is a leak. Each bridge has a set of traffic lights the keeper can turn on if he thinks it necessary, but this time they were blank.

Muttering darkly, Sheila put Sanity over onto the bank (in a tricky cross wind), where we hung about until they'd finished and swung the bridge.

Just a bit further down the canal there's a place where you can get diesel and Calor gas, so we tied opposite to eat lunch, then I took over the helm, Sheila being well worn from the morning's exercise, and put Sanity across there.

We took on rather more diesel than I was expecting to need, and the Calor bottle cost over £21, the most I've ever paid for one, but hey ho, there you go.

Off we went again down to Patch Bridge, the closest approach to Slimbridge, and managed to find a space on the visitor mooring there. It's only a short walk down to the Wildlife and Wetland Centre, and very good it is too. You can't get the full benefit on one visit – at least we couldn't before our much molested feet threatened to go on strike, but it's a great place, and we must clearly come back here on another occasion.

Tomorrow we'll go on down to Sharpness to see the docks there, then back to Saul for the weekend and another visit from Elanor before going on to arrive in Gloucester on Monday, probably.