Hip Hop and we stopped.

Travelled 1.35 miles, worked 1 lock in a time of 1 hour 5 minutes.

I had a wonderful night listening to nothingness really. It was so hot that I lay on top of the bed clothes just listening to the sound of Keith sleeping and not a peep going on outside. I must have drifted of to sleep at some point because the next thing I new it was 8 am and it was time for my first cuppa of the day.

We left the mooring at Shardlow at 9.40 am, which is incredibly late for us, but we only planned to find somewhere to moor for the weekend and so knew it was just a short hop. Leaving later though was perhaps not a great idea, because when I took Paddy out for his walk there were boats already queuing at the bottom of Shardlow Lock. One of the hire boats had moored on the lock moorings all night, because they could not find anywhere else to moor, which caused some upset with a couple of the other boats who could not get in to work the lock and another boat was bow hauling his hire boat to the water point blocking the bridge ‘ole. So maybe just maybe we should have gotten up earlier.

We only had Aston Lock to do, but as we approached the lock there were already two boats queuing and a wide beam in the lock coming down. Oh the joys of the T&M. As the wide beam left the lock the private boat and hire boat entered the lock and we then managed to get on to the lock landing, where I secured the centre line and then walked up to help with the lock. having helped with the lock gates I turned to see if Keith was alright on the boat to see three further boats mooring up being him, two hire boats and a plastic cruiser. We shared the lock with one of the hire boats who were out for 2 weeks and already loving every moment of it.

Just after leaving the lock we pulled in and moored up and this would be our home for the weekend. We wanted to let the world and his wife play whilst we sat and watched. Since being moored up, which was at 10.45 am there have been absolutely loads of boats on the move, hire boats and private boats alike, I am so pleased we decided to moor up early. I think we maybe back to early morning starts from now on.

For those of you who pop into my other photograph blogs I have updated them both and I dare say there will be more photographs over the weekend, although the weather for tomorrow is not great, more rain and thunder storms expected.

• Canal Side Flora and Fauna
• Sunrise and Sunset