Homeward Bound

Hello Friends and Followers.

Another miserable start to the day, with incredibly low cloud causing drizzly rain when we set off from Hawkesbury Junction. We passed through Sutton Stop Lock and headed off towards Ansty. We found ourselves behind another boat, who was quite happily pootling, which I do not have a problem with. What I do have a problem with however, is when that pootling boater has seen us behind him and he sits in the middle and makes no attempt to allow us through. he was pootling at 1 mph and we were in neutral and reverse. In the end he drifted to the offside and so we made a run for it up his inside. He did not acknowledge us and we said nothing to him. By all means pootle, but do consider those behind you.

We were making good headway until we got close to Newbold and we join another queue of boats this time we had three in front of us. The boat in front of us was as confused as we were as to why progress was so slow. As we approached the tunnel the lead boat was weaving all over the canal and finally allowed us all through. It turned out they were hirers on their way back base. As we came through Newbold the second boat pulled in and moored up, which left the boat in front of us and us to get underway. It is amazing how quickly you can pick up speed and make distance between you when not held up.

Onward through Rugby, where our good friend Ian and Irene were moored on NB FreeSpirit.

Sadly it as a fleeting wave and a shout of "Hello", as we needed to plough on. Hopefully we will see there somewhere next year, as I am pretty sure we have a lot of chin wagging to do over tea.
The boat in front of us got a gallop on and we only caught up with them at Hillmorton Locks, where they only had one of each set of locks open, due to a broken beam on one of the middle locks. I had a nice chat with the volunteer lockies and the boater in front of us, who had helped with coal boating back in the day and was interested to know if the two boats he helped on were still going strong. I was able to cheer his day by telling him Elstree and Lyra are still on the canal and Lyra is still working. By the time we cleared the locks they were gone into the distance with Braunston being their destination.

After another long day we moored at Bridge 100 on the Grand Union/Oxford Canals link west of Braunston. The plan was to wait out Storm Brian, which was promised and to possibly stay the weekend. Over night the wind most definitely got up a head of steam and there were waves on the canal. The plan to stay put was a good one, as we have watched the Napton hire boats going out and really struggling. One of them managed to clobber us as they tried to make headway.
Hopefully tomorrow will be calmer.

Pop back soon xx