What weekends are made of.

Hi Friends and Fellow Bloggers.

It was an absolutely glorious Saturday. The sun was out and even though it was chilly it was a typical Autumnal day. Friday we moved off of the 48 hour moorings near Union Wharf and moved on to the Logan Street Wharf moorings. The Wharf is no longer in use for what it was built for. It was used as part of Woodford's Woodyard. The main part of the yeard was in Union Wharf. Logan Street Wharf was not so grand and by the 1940's it was only producing bean sticks and fire wood. I feel that being here unloading coal to customers, we are giving it a new life. The yard itself was given over to housing, so all that remains is the stone Wharf, which is very sad. Still it makes an excellent mooring for us and our customers who come to us by car to collect their coal. Early hours there was I snoozing away, only to be woken by loud voices and footsteps. From what I could hear it was a youngish couple, probably on the way home from the pub, as the female sounded a little worse for wear.The young man said "Oh look its the coal boat".The young woman's reply was "What's a coal boat?"He replied " The people on this boat carry coal and deliver it up and down the system"Whether she understood what he said I have no idea, because he then asked her to follow him. I hope they got home safely, because it was about 2am.I did manage to doze back off to sleep and the next thing I knew it was around 6.30am and time for a cuppa. (it is becoming a habit). Once up and about, Paddy had his walk first up the towpath. Several times when moored along here, we have met this man on his bike with four dogs in tow. How on earth he manages to ride his bike and tow the dogs along at the same time, I really do not know. One of these days one of the dogs will see something interesting in the reeds by the canal and he will be dragged into the water. Probably kicking and screaming. It is not an advisable way to take your dogs out for exercise. After breakfast the jobs of the day were discussed and first on the list was the oil and filter change on the generator. Because the oil was cold it took ages and ages for it to drain out of the generator, so whilst this took place Keith contacted ATS to enquire if our wheels had been repaired, as we really need our sack barrow at the moment. Thankfully he was informed they were ready for collection, so off he trotted with his rucksack to collect wheels and new tyres. What we did not envisiage was the cost of the replacement tyres and inner tubes. The bill came to over £80, which seems an awful lot to me, but they did have to be ordered in. We need the sack barrow so there wsas nothing for it but to pay the man. Whilst Keith was picking himself up off the ATS floor from the shock of the price, I was sorting out coal for a regular customer, who we supplied last year, he always collects his coal in his van. Keith came back from ATS, so we had some lunch and then put a new filter and new oil in the generator. That is another job jobbed for a while. Just sat down to do my online Tesco shop when a new customer called for some coal. Saturday was a great day, which ended with us watching the TV.

Sunday morning and the sun is shining. There was mist rolling on the surface of the water and the birds were singing, it does not get much better than this.
Having done the usual things first thing in the morning, we also made an alteration to our back cabin stove chimney, because with the butterfly baffle in the chimney it keeps clogging up, so we have taken it out and are going to try and run the fire without it. It will make my life so much easier when it comes to cleaning the chimney out, well this is what I am hoping.
We left the Logan Street Wharf mooring at 9.30 and set off to find friends Jenny and Jim, who required coal. No sooner we had left the mooring, we were stuck in tickover as we passed wall to wall fishermen, who were involved in a fishing competition. One of the gentlemen asked "Are you the only one".
I replied "As far as I know". What I did not know was there would be a dozen boats coming past an hour later, as they left the Union Wharf at Market Harborough. I bet the fishing match was not best pleased. Approaching Saunt's Bridge. It was picturesque under the trees.In the shade of the tree's it was a little on the nippy side, but in the sun it was glorious. Last night the temperature got down to 2.2 C, so a little chilly to say the least. I actually love this sort of weather. As we came under Saunt's bridge, lazing in the sun up against a tree was this beautiful cat. Clearly they were enjoying the sunshine, which was nice and warm.
On approaching the Gallow Hill stretch we saw nb Jolly Rodger moored up. Jenny and Jim were blacking their boat, so we moored up in front of them and unloaded their coal. It was a good opportunity to have a natter. It is always nice to catch up on peoples news and of course any gossip. The gossip was a bit light on the ground, but their news filled the time spent chatting. We decided it was such a beautiful spot that we would stay put for the day.I was about to make a coffee when I started to watch this vehicle spraying the field opposite us. What bothered me is what the farmer was spraying on his field. It looked a little Florescent to me. Maybe I will be glowing in the dark later, either that or I will grow an extra head overnight.
I mentioned the fishing competition, well as we stood chatting to Jenny and Jim the flow tiller of boats began to pour past us. I commented to one of the boaters "I bet the fishermen loved you lot"
His reply was "They were pulling their hair out". A dozen boats passed us by as they headed back to Crick after a weekend out. Later on the fishermen will have the hire boats to contend with, as they head back to the basin for the Monday morning turn around. Unfortuately if fishermen want to fish on the canal, they will have to put up with boats passing all the time. We have to put up with running in tickover as we pass rod after rod and we do not complain. Many of the fishermen we meet and greet are very polite, but you do also get some miserable buggers.
So here we are at Gallow Hill in the sunshine. it is lovely here and we have a fantastic TV signal, so I can watch the X-Factor tonight. My money is on Wagner and Aiden going tonight, but what do I know?
On the subject of the X-Factor. I wish Cher Lloyd would do more than just rap. I am fed up with that now. I would just love to hear her sing. Katie did very well last night and I felt that she showed why she should be in this final. My favourite though was Mary Byrne. She has the most amazing voice.
Oh well off now to do something with my Sunday afternoon.