Some serious boating

Well, by our standards, anyway. It's three locks and a bit over four and a half miles from Wightwick to Coven and we wanted to stop in Compton to shop, so we reckoned on something over three and a half hours. We got away a bit before eight on a cool, damp day, the rain not quite drizzling, more spitting at us.

We were soon up the two Wightwick locks and Sheila walked on to Compton to reconnoitre the moorings. She found a space between the road bridge and the lock into which we popped at half eight. A quick trip to the Sainsbury's Local found most of what we wanted. These smaller in-town supermarkets only have limited ranges, of course, and it very much depends on what the locals like to buy as to whether you find what you prefer.

Back at the boat, we left the shopping in its bags until we got going again. Once up the lock, Sheila took over steering whilst I stowed stuff, then we swapped so that she could get the washing machine going.

After that, it was a bit of a damp plod through Tettenhall and past the Wolves race course and the two junctions, Aldersley and Autherley. It was now around ten, so not surprisingly we had to wait half way through the Rockin' for a couple of boats to come through the other way. Fortunately, both we and the first of the others had deployed crew ahead on the towpath, so there were no surprises.

I held Sanity Again opposite one of the passing lay-byes for them to come through. The surrounding become more rural after that and we finally tied on the visitor moorings beyond the Anchor after half eleven.

Soup and sandwiches for lunch, then a quiet afternoon watching the other boats go by. Even though the Four Counties is broken at Middlewich (and seems likely to remain so until after next winter) there is much more traffic here than south of the junctions, including Brian on the coal boat Halsall, though selling more diesel than coal now, I guess.

We'll sit tight here tomorrow, then go on to Gailey for a couple of nights. We've arranged to meet Dave from Cabincare at Penkridge on Monday to discuss installing fly screens in the hatches.