Breaking Ice and Deliveries.

Hi Friends.

With yet another sharp overnight frost the canal was frozen again this morning, which was not what the doctor called for, because we wanted to move on towards Welford. Having done all the usual morning jobs, which I do everyday we fired up the engine and left our weekend mooring. The ice was about ¼" thick when we set off, but it soon thickened to about 1" for most of the journey. In all the journey took us 6 hours and 10 minutes which normally takes us about 3½ hours, but at least we did sell a few bags of coal along the way, which made it all worth while. We sold our first coal of the day at Crick to a couple of customers, we then stopped at Yelvertoft and supplied coal to two new customers. I think everyone is stocking up, just in case the bad weather comes back again. Breaking ice is a lot of fun but it is not good for the blacking on the hull. I think we have pretty much taken all of our blacking off now, but thankfully we are blacking it again in May and needs must, because our customers are important to us. When you take on an area to deliver coal in, your customers expect and hope that you will be regular or at least let them know if you cannot make it on time. Even though it was a cold day, with the sun out the cold did not reach my bones for a change. We moored up at Welford Junction and NB Roehaise with Jackie and Ray onboard came in behind us, they had been moored behind us at Crick as well. Yesterday Jackie and I had a lovely walk with the dogs Paddy and her dog Tess.

I am now waiting for my Sausage Stew and Dimplings to cook, so we can settle in for the evening with a warming dinner. I have a feeling I will be in bed early tonight, because it has been a long and busy day.

Chat soon xx

Saturday Bake Day.

Hello Friends old and new.

With the temperature getting down to -6c overnight, once more the canal has a film of ice on it. Just as well we had no plans to move today.
I had allsorts of ideas on what to do today, and as always first on my list of things to do was walk Paddy up the towpath. Just as I stepped off of the boat, I could hear a boat crashing through the ice. NB Red Red Wine made short work of the ice as it headed for Crick Tunnel. If you have never heard ice on the hull of a boat, it is an eerie sort of noise as it cracks against the steel. From inside the boat it sounds a lot louder.
After toast for breakfast, I walked up to the Post Office to post a Birthday card and to get some frozen peas. It was one thing I did not order when I placed my Tesco food order and I always like to keep peas in the freezer for emergencies.
Back on board, I decided that Saturday was going to be my baking day instead of Sunday. So I began with making my Lemon Drizzle Cake.

Lemon Drizzle Cake.

4oz Butter.

4oz Caster Sugar.

6oz Self Rasing Flour

2 Lemons.

Vanilla Essence.

3 Eggs.

Icing Sugar.

Cream the Butter and Sugar together and add a little Vanilla Essence. Add the grated Lemon rind. Add the 3 eggs and beat into the mixture. Fold in the Flour and pur the mixture into a baking tin. Whilst the cake is baking, put the juice from the Lemons into a saucepan and add Icing Sugar to taste. Once the Icing Sugar has desolved remove from the heat. No sooner the cake is cooked, leave it in the tin and prick the top all over. Pour the Lemon juice over the top and allow the cake to soak up the juice before removing the cake from the tin. You can also do the same with Oranges.

Second on my baking list was a Rubarb Crumble for Pudding.

At the moment it is waiting to go in the back stove oven. I already have some Pork Chops cooking in a red Wine gravy in there, so the Crumble will have to wait for a bit. Whilst I was doing all of this, I also swept the floor and did all the washing up. Oh and I delivered coal to a customer who was collecting by car. Unfortunately my crumpets went cold and hard whilst gone, so I had to re-toast them on my return. Maybe tomorrow it will be a quiet day as I will have no baking to do ;0).

Chat soon xx

Below zero and woolly jumpers.

Hi Friends.

It was a very cold night last night. When we woke up it was -5c and there was a thin layer of ice on the canal again. I made sure I put on more layers for our journey from Welford Junction to Crick.A long the way we saw workmen cutting back the hedges and banks and a very good job they were making. It is so nice to see everything cut back properly. As to whether they will keep it up throughout the Spring and Summer we will have to see.
At Mountain Barn, we stoppped to supply three customers with their coal orders and as always had a nice natter.
Whilst on the move I made us toasted Crumpets for lunch with Butter and Marmite (not the cat) spread on them and they were very yummy.
We had a really pleasant journey and met up with Four other boats on the move.
Having moved through Crick tunnel we were back out into the open countryside and saw plenty of Lambs. Two weeks previous we had only seen a couple of lambs in the same field, but now there were hundreds. They certainly needed their woolly coats. This field of Sheep made me giggle as they were playing follow my leader. I just hope the leader knew where she was going. There is something very cute about watching Lambs feeding from their mum, with their little tails wagging behind them. We eventually moored up at 2.45pm and immediately began supplying coal to our customers, who knew were were arriving today. It is always nice to be welcomed. We will be staying here all weekend, and hope to supply other people with coal as they are passing.
I hope you have a lovely weekend and thank you for popping in.

Chat soon xx

Vets and up the flight.

Hi Friends.

Brrrrrrrrrr it has been a freezing day, with flurries of snow in the air.
My alarm went off at 7am. We had to be up early to take Mog and Dog to the vets for their second vaccinations. But before that, I had a customer to supply with coal and toilet blue. Delivery and a good old chinwag done, we put Mog in her box and Dog on his lead and set off into town for the vets appointment. We got there early and were fortunate to be sent in no sooner we had sat down. Marmite and Paddy were very well behaved whilst having their needles, so we were only in there five minutes, but we still had to pay out over £50 for the treatment, which I find silly money. I will be shopping around for next years vaccinations.
We left Market Harborough at 10.35 am heading for the Foxton flight of locks. It was very chilly indeed, so we were both well wrapped up against the cold.
It is fast approaching the season to be amourous and I have noticed that the Swan's on our stretch have been getting very territorial. So as we cruised through Foxton Village a Cob was seeing off another Cob, who had wandered on to his patch. Thankfully it did not end up with them fighting, the Cob who was in the wrong place, was soon off to find another place to set up his territory. Or maybe he will come back to try his luck another day.
I managed to do the Foxton Village Swing Bridge with a little help from one of the May Gurney workmen, who are working once more on the Swing Bridge. I got chatting to the workman who agreed with me that the bridge was still no better, even though he had swept the runners. I do wonder if it will ever be any good. It took us just 45 minutes to get up the flight of 10 locks and I was now rather warm. There were no gongoozlers, just one man and his Whippet. I suppose the weather had clearly put people off of coming out. As we left the flight, Keith and i tucked into the Sausage Rolls I had cooking in the back cabin stove. They certainly warmed my core up, which was beginning to cool rapidly.

As we cruised near the home of Piggy French at Lubenham Bridge, I noticed a large branch sticking out of the water. It was infact not just a branch but the whole rotten tree, which was right across the canal, so we had to try and move it out of our way. We know that the patrol officer has it down for chopping up, but this was when it was still attached to the bank. Now it has tried to escape capture and is roaming helpless in the water.The tree seemed to have a fatal attraction towards the boat, which was a little worrying, because I could see it attacking our sheeting and showing no mercy. Thankfully the branch being rotten broke off and released our boat from its grip and we were on our way once more.

We arrived at Welford Junction at 3.55pm and are now moored up for the night. I will not be venturing outside anymore tonight, because it is freezing out.

Despite the cold it was a very pleasant cruise.

Deliveries and sales.

Hello Friends.

We had a slow start to our day because we had to wait for a Tesco food delivery to arrive, which was due between 11am and 1pm, so the morning began with a cuppa in bed and a discussion as to what we will do when in dry dock in May. For those wondering why we are going into dry dock. Our boat needs to have her hull blacked at the beginning of May and to do this you can either have the boat lifted out of the water by crane and put out on to the bank at a boat yard, or you can move the boat into a dry dock. Of course it is not dry when you move the boat in, the water has to be pumped out of the dock, this then creates a dry dock where you can work on your boat. Keith and I always black the hull ourselves, which is not particularly hard work if you know what your doing. When we get to that day I will post photograph's and an explanation. Discussions then moved on to where we would go after we finish our Winter coal run at the end of March. I suggested that we should go down to Braunston, as we need to get a few bits from Midland Chandlers for the boat, this will only take us a few days, we can then come back up on to the Leicester Line to wait for our dry docking. Whilst we were chatting Marmite was making it quite clear she wanted us to get up, because her food dishes were empty, so we obliged and rolled the bed up and closed the bed'ole door for the day. Keith laid up breakfast, whilst I raked out the back cabin stove fire. I needed to leave the bottom door open to get the fire going as it was a little dead. Breakfast eaten Paddy was next to get my attention. He was quick to get ready for his walk and was sat by the back doors with his tail wagging. No sooner we were up the towpath he did what he needed to do and then legged it back to the boat for his breakfast.

Whilst waiting for our food delivery, which by text I was informed would be between 11am and 12 noon, Keith went on the online to the Gildings Auction Room (CLICK) site to listen and watch today's auction taking place. We had interest in the auction, because Keith had placed two Beatles records into the auction, but because we were lot two hundred and three he had a long wait (CLICK). We did not expect to get much for the LP's, but we did not see any point them laying on the boat going to ruin. As it turned out Keith got £35 for the pair, which was much more than we expected. Of course he has to pay commission, so he will end up with about £29, which is still great and the records will have gone to a good home we hope.


I am still struggling with the cold I developed back before the New Year. I do not feel ill, because if I did I would be down at the doctors quick smart, I just wish I could get rid of the cough I have been left with. I wake up in the morning coughing like I have been smoking all night long. I have a dreadful feeling I am stuck with it now until the weather warms up grrrrr. If all else fails I will visit the GP to see if there is anything he can do, just in case it has caused an infection.

With auction over, we slipped our mooring in the rain and set off through Foxton Swing Bridge to deliver coal to a customer. That bridge is a pain in the rear even though it has been fixed. I am no weakling, but I still struggle with it.
Coal delivered we cruised to Bridge 14 and the Union Canal Society Moorings, which is where we will be staying for the night. The rain has stopped, leaving a very dull afternoon. I am not sure what the rest of the day will bring, but I am quite happy to put my feet up until dinner time. Then I will be busy again with the usual mundane things that us women have to do, so I will sign off now and wish you a lovely day.

Chat soon xx

A Short Jaunt.

Hi Friends.

There is not much to say about today, as it has been pretty uneventful. We did the usual stuff this morning, which of course is not that entertaining when you read the same thing everyday.
We eventually moved off and cruised for 15 minutes before mooring up at Black Horse Bridge, Foxton, which is where I will be getting my Tesco food delivery tomorrow all being well. Since we have been here at Black Horse Bridge, I have had one customer and seen one narrowboat, which was NB Wilver owned by William and Virginia and their dog Gunner, they are now moored up behind us waiting for a coal delivery of their own from DMW fuels (CLICK).
With so little going on today, I will comment on last nights TV and 'Dancing on Ice'. With the 12 remaining skaters now in a competition to take the 2011 crown, it will be interesting to see who comes out on top. There are already some stars in the making, Sam Attwater is clearly heads and tails above the rest at the moment. Steven Arnold was the first to be voted off by the judging panel, which was not surprizing because he was not very good. Steven also failed to turn up on Monday for his choreography class which was unforgiveable. So let the competition begin and may the best man or woman win.
Right with my battery almost dead, I am off now to make a cuppa.

Chat soon xx

Girl on phone falls into fountain!!!

Just shows you should pay more attention to your surroundings.

From Market to Meerkat Harborough.

It looks like the Meerkats will be making an appearance in the town sometime soon if all goes to plan. CLICK
Whilst the advert drives some people to distraction, others adore the little critters. What is there not to love to be honest?