Monday 2 June 2014

Heading back, gradually

We need to be in Alrewas at the other end of this month, so we're not exactly under time pressure to get there. The plan is to take a wander up and back down the Ashby, a canal we've not done for many years.

This morning we made a leisurely start; the weather has not exactly broken, but it's not brilliantly sunny either. After bidding farewell to Martin, we headed north out of Braunston, your correspondent steering and Sheila alternating between doing lookout in the bow at the various blind bridges and tackling boat keeping jobs below.

After an hour we were nearing the Prison moorings where we stopped to paint the well deck on the way down. There was still at least another hour to go to Hillmorton, so Sheila got the washing machine started. There's a big backlog of laundry after not having a chance to do much whilst tied at Crick.

Traffic was frequent but not a problem; the number of boats moored on the towpath was more of a hindrance to rapid progress. On the other hand, the cut seems to be decently dredged along here, allowing Sanity Again to make good speed through the water when not pootling along in tick over.

We had a good run down Hillmorton ninety minutes later; Sheila had to turn the first lock, but Volockies were on hand to help at the second and third. There was plenty of room on the visitor moorings both above and below the flight and we've tied on our usual spot, the newish Armco round the corner from the lower VMs.

It's been a quiet afternoon watching the washing dry on the airer in the bow; the weather's not reliable enough to use the whirligig. I wasn't totally idle; I've done the monthly battery top up.

Tomorrow, we'll stop at Brownsover for a serious Tesco shop. The store cupboards are pretty empty, so it will probably need two trips. We'll then go on to Newbold for the night and possibly stay there on Wednesday if the forecast heavy rain materialises.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

We were moored at Newbold this am, you must have moored up while I had wandered to the Co-op. We were on our way to Rugby Wharf for an engine service tomorrow.
It was only after we set off and said afternoon to Sheila and said awww bless when we saw you having a snooze that I saw the name of the boat. We are on NB Smile and Wave.
Sorry we didn't get to have a chat.
We are from the L&L so will look out for you again on our return north in a couple of months. Love the blog by the way.
Take care
Heather & Mike

Bruce in Sanity said...

Hi!

Good to hear from you. Sheila said she'd seen you go by, but didn't mention the remark about me recovering from the morning's exertions... She did observe that the dog could be mistaken for a sheep in a bad light, mind.

Strangely enough, two of our fellow moorers and lodge owners at Mercia, Steve and Sal, have also called their boat Smile and Wave.

Hope the service goes ok and maybe see you later.

All the best

Bruce