Friday 14th October.
This, as you all know, will be the last entry for 2011, unless of course something astonishing occurs before next April, when I’ll write an entry or two.
Meanwhile, some facts and figures about this trip.
We have just 23 miles to go to Willington, which will bring our total this year to 530. During the 28 weeks and 3 days that we’ve been out we would have passed through 456 locks and actually cruised for about 210 hours. We would also have stopped overnight at 137 different locations.
Goodness knows how much water we have used, or how much diesel we have bought, all that info will be in Wifey’s diary. Where water is concerned we are nowhere near the consumption of the average British household. As for diesel, well, that could take some calculation, but it’s quite a lot. However, up until the end of August we had used 674 litres (147 gallons) at a total cost of £687.04p.
Compared to road travelling vehicles, this is cheap but, despite all efforts by the EU, farm vehicles and the domestic use of red diesel in boats is still subsidised. We now have to pay full price for propulsion, and this has been the case since soon after we bought the boat, but for heating and charging of batteries we still benefit from the reduction.
These facts, along with any more that come to mind, I’ll enter when I know.
Sunday 16th October.
Yesterday we made our way down from Handsacre to Fradley Junction and will stay here until tomorrow morning. If yesterday is anything to go by we’ll be sitting outside The Swan at lunchtime, enjoying even more sunshine. Boating traffic is now thinning out but, as it is the weekend and the sun is out, the weekenders are still with us. October is very much like April where boating is concerned. During the week there’s not much going on but, come the weekend and you can’t move for them, much less find a mooring spot. And finding a mooring spot is all in the timing, which we are getting rather good at.
Just beside this stretch of moorings, which lies between two locks, there’s a BW wildlife reserve, with a lake and pathways running around it. To my mind, and even though it is designated as an area for various species of birds and insects, the lake is far too quiet. Now, I’m not a kiddie person, in fact I find most of them to be quite obnoxious, but I really do believe that this lake would benefit from a few youngsters in canoes and kayaks. I’m not talking masses of the little monsters, perhaps a small club or two with special permission from BW and overseen by responsible adults. Of course, it will never happen. Just a thought.
Monday 17th October.
Yesterday my hopes of sitting outside The Swan at Fradley Junction and enjoying a pint or three of Murphy’s, were dashed by the cool breeze and heavy clouds. Of course, after those pints the clouds dissipated and the sun came out!!
We made it through four locks and two miles to Alrewas this morning before the high winds developed, but this is another of those places that, despite having visited before on several occasions, I still didn’t recall the layout of until we had arrived. We moored up just as soon as we were able after passing through the last lock and then, because this spot was somewhat narrowed down by overhanging trees, moved on a little further and then, having walked into the village for a few bits and pieces, we returned via the towpath further up and, seeing that it was completely empty of boats, moved along for the second and final time.
By this time of course, my nearest and dearest had had enough but, since I had no just cause to move again, here we will stay until the morrow, at which time, weather permitting, we’ll move on to Branston, where I’m hoping we’ll partake of a pub lunch, the last one on this cruise and signifying the 50th pub this year. Yep, we’ve visited 49 pubs in the past seven months. Now, that is some pub crawl.
Tuesday 18th October.
Yesterday we really felt the change in the weather, very high winds and some really heavy rain, and we’re approaching a short stretch of the River Trent at the first lock we come to. Still, I doubt it was enough to put the river into spate. Going down the lock, if I remember correctly, we have about 100 yards of canal, after which the river crosses at a ‘T’ from left to right. We then ride the river for a short while and it leaves us again to continue down the canal.
Thankfully the wind has died down and it has stopped raining, so we should be able to complete the five miles and four locks to Branston this morning. Wednesday Branston to Willington then, after paying a visit to the doctor, into the marina on Thursday morning. Job done!
Of course, should the weather turn foul again, we’ll have to stay here another day.
15.30 the same day…
Phew! That wind! Strong doesn’t even begin to describe it. But, lucky old us, we left Alrewas early, about 7.45, and completed the five miles and four locks to Branston Water Park moorings in 2½ hours, long before the wind really got up.
As usual after arriving at a new spot, we sat around for awhile drinking tea and nattering, after which we strolled into town for the paper and the promised pub lunch. We dined at The Blacksmiths Arms on our way through here in April, so we knew we were in for a decent meal. I plumped for the Italian Spicy Meat Ball with Pasta, whilst Wifey went for the Liver and Onion with Mash and Gravy. I’m pleased to say that there was enough there to satisfy and that neither of us required a pudding. However, behind the bar under a domed cover were slices of Carrot Cake, which I simply could not resist, so the guvnor had a couple of slices wrapped in foil for us to take away.
This pub, along with the Newbold Arms, is one of the cleanest pubs we have come across during this years cruise and, with meals at around a fiver is highly recommended by both of us. In fact we were so pleased with the service that we have decided to make a point of coming again whilst moored at Mercia Marina this winter. Last winter we weren’t too sure about the wisdom of taking the boat out, what with me recuperating from my op. But this year will be a different story as we are determined to take every opportunity to spend time on the canal.
Hopefully the wind will have died down again by morning, at which time we’ll cruise the seven miles and two locks to Willington, where we will call in to the surgery for renewed prescriptions and to make appointments. After that and assuming the weather is still OK, we’ll go on to the marina.
Thursday morning, all being well, I will endeavour to post this, the last blog for this year. One of our first jobs once we are securely tied up and all shopping is done, will be to go through our photos and put names to them. We will then sort them out and copy the best ones – in our amateur opinions – into a separate folder for onward copying to CD or DVD. Any member of our delightful families should place their order by email as soon as possible, after which we will be happy to hand out copies when we all meet in March or, if you are agog with excitement and can’t wait, we’ll be pleased to post them on. Your choice.
Thursday 20th October.
That’s all Folks, the last blog of 2011.
But first, our final cruise yesterday, from Branston to Willington and on to Mercia Marina. Oh boy, what a morning!
There were quite a few boats moored at Branston, several of which were heading our way and so, not wishing to have to compete with them at the only two locks along the seven mile home stretch, we left at 7.45 am.
Up until we had almost reached the outskirts of Willingon the day was fin, with just a light, following breeze, just the job for cruising, especially on our final day out. But – there’s always a but isn’t there? – with about half a mile to go the clouds started really building up and we passed through a couple of light showers.
We stopped at Willington at about 10.45 and paid a visit to the surgery to put in a prescription and make an appointment, then we popped into the Co-op for a few bits and pieces.
We arrived back at the boat at about 11.15 and prepared to move on to Mercia and, just as we cast off our mooring ropes and pushed off, the rain started. Within five minutes or so the heavens opened up and, by the time we arrived at the diesel pump in the marina, the wind was gusting and we were soaked. And we still had to fill the tank up.
But first we had to telephone the office and ask someone to come and unlock the pump. It’s still raining quite heavily at this point.
So, along comes Rob, the boss man. He must have Irish blood because the rain stopped just for him and, amazingly, the wind dropped too.
Naturally enough, in order for us to have further difficulties, if not with the rain then at least with the wind, another delay occurred, this time in the shape of the local hire boat company whose engineer needed to top one of their boats up with fuel.
With the diesel filler line being too short to reach our filler cap and in order to delay us even further, we then had to move the boat forward a few feet. That done we finally filled up with diesel at a final cost of £108.
At this point the wind decided to throw a tantrum, just to make life interesting over the final couple of hundred yards to our moorings. This involved winkling the sharp end between a boat and the pontoon which, in gusting wind, inevitably results in a ‘slight’ bump against the other boat. Thankfully the owner of said boat doesn’t live on his so, what the eyes don’t see, the heart can; grieve over.
Finally we tied up and attached our mains cable, by which time the wind had dropped, the sky had cleared and the sun had come out.
And that dear reader was our last cruising day of 2011.
During our winter break, which should last until the middle of March, I’m hoping to rearrange to pages of the blog to appear a little brighter and more interesting. With a little luck I’ll be in a position to post a few photos on our extended cruise in 2012.
Until then we three on Shiralee wish you all the best of health and whatever else you wish for yourself and yours.
Cheers me dears!
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
Wednesday, 19 October 2011
Thursday, 13 October 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #32
Tuesday 11th October.
Yesterday was most enjoyable, but a little trying on my legs. First thing after breakfast we walked from the boat; which was moored as far away from town as we could possibly get; all the way up to the third lock, just to empty our cassette and dispose of our rubbish. Of course, we then had to walk back.
After that little exercise, and knowing I would be walking into town to meet Alan and Chris, I let Wifey go to get the paper and visit the bank.
Alan phoned at about 10.40 to say they had boarded their bus and would be arriving at about 11 o/clock so off we went again. We then headed for the Wetherspoon’s pub, which just so happens to be beside the bus stop, and enjoyed a coffee and long chat before heading back to the boat.
Just before we left to meet up with them though, I noticed that there were quite a few spaces vacant between our boat and the water point, which presented an opportunity to move down a bit. No such luck though because, by the time we got back all those places had been filled, so we’re still at the back of the queue.
Later in the afternoon we all headed back to Wetherspoon’s for lunch and, would you believe it, they had run out of Guinness? Actually they hadn’t run out, they were changing the barrel, but I didn’t hear them say that and settled for a lager instead. I’m nothing if not versatile!!
Our two meals came to less than a tenner and were most enjoyable. I can’t think why we haven’t used Wetherspoon’s on our earlier visits, with Guinness at only £2.75 and all bitters at £1.99, they really are the cheapest around. Some of their meals even come with a free drink, even though the price would be most acceptable without the freebie. If they can be so reasonable, why can’t the other breweries?
After all the chat and catching up, we walked to the bus stop with Alan and Chris, the return one being across town and nearer to the canal. Unfortunately, and despite their own aversion to hordes of kids on buses, they were treated to a bunch of them leaving school. Oh dear, what a shame, tut, tut!
Our friends should be back in the U.K. sometime in January, but they’ll be jetting off to Cyprus then, so it’s unlikely we’ll meet again at that time. Still, it will be good to see them again, whenever that will be.
Today we should be leaving Stone and making our way back towards Mercia Marina. I emailed Lucy there yesterday morning to let her know our due arrival date, but as yet I haven’t received a reply. The problem is, once again we are faced with high winds this morning, so there’s a good chance we may have to stay another day, but that’s really not a problem as we have several days in hand.
Wednesday 12th October.
Topped up with water and left Stone yesterday morning, arriving at the bottom of Sandon Lock at about 11 am. This is a peaceful little mooring and apart from one other boat moored about 50 yards ahead of us, we were on our own.
This morning we set out about 8.15 and, after just one more lock and four miles, we arrived at our current moorings, somewhere between bridges 78 and 77 and nobody else will be able to join us because there is only enough space for one boat, and that’s ours!
Tomorrow we must get to Great Haywood because we are almost out of coal. With just enough room for about three boats, Great Haywood can be difficult to stop at but, since the next possible place for buying coal is at Fradley Junction, we really don’t have a choice. Meanwhile we’re going to enjoy the rest of today and tonight in peace and solitude.
Now, Great Haywood Junction, which joins the Trent and Mersey to the Staffs and Worcester, has an Anglo Welsh boatyard, BW water point and rubbish disposal and the boatyard has an Elsan disposal unit, which we’ve used in the past. They also sell diesel and coal, the latter of which we were desperately short of. There is room for about three boats at the water point, so it can be a bit tricky stopping there when it’s busy and we really weren’t looking forward to doing so.
But luck was on our side this morning when, much to our surprise and delight, who should appear coming towards us but the Coal Boat and its Butty. There are several of these boats cruising the waterways and we always try to buy from them rather than marinas, most of which can be quite a bit dearer. When they are fully laden they do sit pretty low in the water and, due to the weight they are towing, they move along very slowly, which is just as well because it can take some time to stop a load of several tonnes of coal at speed.
Anyway, we gave them a wave and shouted our order to them. Unfortunately the man was in some pain from broken ribs and was having some difficulty carrying the coal bags, and I could be no help with my knees and, with the towpath being mostly grass, bringing our trolley out would have been a waste of time, so he had to carry all four bags on his own. Still, he didn’t seem too upset about it and we parted in fine moods, especially us now that we only had to stop short of Great Haywood and walk our rubbish and Elsan down.
While Sheila walked around to the boatyard to empty our Elsan cassette, I dumped the rubbish in the bin. I then went looking for her but, since I had never used the Elsan unit before, I had no idea where it was. When she came back she told me that they now charge £1 for using it and, when she explained to the woman there that she hadn’t brought her purse with her, her reply was, “Well, you’ll just have to come back then, won’t you?” Miserable cow! Watch out for this one folks, she’s a meanie alright. As it happens, when Sheila mentioned this to one of their workmen, he said, “Forget it”, so we did. These boatyards don’t normally charge for this facility, especially if you are purchasing other goods, such as coal or diesel, so they must be feeling the economic pinch.
Thursday 13th October.
Today we are moving on to Bridge 69, another site that’s way off the beaten track, but at least we’ll be able to watch TV there. Would you believe it, last night we wanted to watch Midsomer Murders but, as is usual with these instances, the ITV channels were breaking up. However, all is not lost, because I know we have a strong Internet signal at bridge 69, so we can watch it on the laptop through ITV Player, so there!”
We are now only a week away from Mercia Marina and winter, so you won’t be receiving many more blogs. I have no idea how many of you actually read them, although I do have one or two followers, but whoever you are I hope you enjoy them, as boring as they seem to me. After all, what I put down here are just day to day happenings and, as you can see, they are sadly lacking in juicy tidbits.
Next year we should be able to introduce you to some new stretches of waterways, in particular the Kennett and Avon Canal which runs from the Thames to Bristol. From what we hear about this canal, it’s not been given much in the way of moorings, so we’re not expecting a particularly enjoyable ride. However, so long as the weather is in our favour we can always pull in to any old section of canal bank and put the plank out if necessary.
The Bristol Channel up to the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal should be pretty interesting too, seeing as how we’ll be paying about £160 for the use of a pilot to steer us around any obstacles.
Crossing the Ribble Link up in Lancashire is a two hour trip, so we’ve been told by somebody who did it this year, but that doesn’t involve a pilot, although we are obliged to wear life belts and must ensure our mobile phone is fully charged.
All in all 2012 should be interesting.
It is now almost 8.30 and whilst sitting here after breakfast, we spotted a few sheep wandering along the towpath. In fact there weren’t just a few, Wifey counted 16 altogether. The obvious thing to do in this situation is to try to locate a local farmer and advise him of the facts. I tried two different 118 numbers and finally came up with a number for a farm near Great Haywoood, about a mile away. This was after a complete failure by those 118 services to find a number anywhere near where we are.
So I telephone the number that they found, only to discover it was a rented property and not a working farm. What’s more, the lady who answered didn’t have a local phone book and could not help at all.
I next tried the Internet and found one near Great Haywood but, just as I was calling them, all those pesky sheep found their way back into the field. However, they had actually found their way back behind the fence separating the canal from the fields. They were not back in their own field and they now have ample opportunity to return to the towpath at any time.
I find it hard to believe that these 118 services are unable to find the number for a farm in this part of Staffordshire, goodness knows there are plenty of them on the map!!
Friday 14th October.
Today we’ll be making our way to Handsacre via Rugeley for shopping at Morrison’s and water top up. For the weekend we’ll probably stay at the top of the locks at Fradley Junction, move on to Alrewas on Monday, Branston Tuesday, Willington Wednesday where we’ll call in to the surgery to make appointments and finally, the marina on Thursday. And that, dear reader, will be that for this year.
Since there is no telling what exciting and stimulating happening may come our way during this last leg of our cruise, I’ll post this now and finish with blog number 33 when we get back to Mercia.
Cheers for now and have a good weekend.
Dave, Sheila and Rustydog!
Yesterday was most enjoyable, but a little trying on my legs. First thing after breakfast we walked from the boat; which was moored as far away from town as we could possibly get; all the way up to the third lock, just to empty our cassette and dispose of our rubbish. Of course, we then had to walk back.
After that little exercise, and knowing I would be walking into town to meet Alan and Chris, I let Wifey go to get the paper and visit the bank.
Alan phoned at about 10.40 to say they had boarded their bus and would be arriving at about 11 o/clock so off we went again. We then headed for the Wetherspoon’s pub, which just so happens to be beside the bus stop, and enjoyed a coffee and long chat before heading back to the boat.
Just before we left to meet up with them though, I noticed that there were quite a few spaces vacant between our boat and the water point, which presented an opportunity to move down a bit. No such luck though because, by the time we got back all those places had been filled, so we’re still at the back of the queue.
Later in the afternoon we all headed back to Wetherspoon’s for lunch and, would you believe it, they had run out of Guinness? Actually they hadn’t run out, they were changing the barrel, but I didn’t hear them say that and settled for a lager instead. I’m nothing if not versatile!!
Our two meals came to less than a tenner and were most enjoyable. I can’t think why we haven’t used Wetherspoon’s on our earlier visits, with Guinness at only £2.75 and all bitters at £1.99, they really are the cheapest around. Some of their meals even come with a free drink, even though the price would be most acceptable without the freebie. If they can be so reasonable, why can’t the other breweries?
After all the chat and catching up, we walked to the bus stop with Alan and Chris, the return one being across town and nearer to the canal. Unfortunately, and despite their own aversion to hordes of kids on buses, they were treated to a bunch of them leaving school. Oh dear, what a shame, tut, tut!
Our friends should be back in the U.K. sometime in January, but they’ll be jetting off to Cyprus then, so it’s unlikely we’ll meet again at that time. Still, it will be good to see them again, whenever that will be.
Today we should be leaving Stone and making our way back towards Mercia Marina. I emailed Lucy there yesterday morning to let her know our due arrival date, but as yet I haven’t received a reply. The problem is, once again we are faced with high winds this morning, so there’s a good chance we may have to stay another day, but that’s really not a problem as we have several days in hand.
Wednesday 12th October.
Topped up with water and left Stone yesterday morning, arriving at the bottom of Sandon Lock at about 11 am. This is a peaceful little mooring and apart from one other boat moored about 50 yards ahead of us, we were on our own.
This morning we set out about 8.15 and, after just one more lock and four miles, we arrived at our current moorings, somewhere between bridges 78 and 77 and nobody else will be able to join us because there is only enough space for one boat, and that’s ours!
Tomorrow we must get to Great Haywood because we are almost out of coal. With just enough room for about three boats, Great Haywood can be difficult to stop at but, since the next possible place for buying coal is at Fradley Junction, we really don’t have a choice. Meanwhile we’re going to enjoy the rest of today and tonight in peace and solitude.
Now, Great Haywood Junction, which joins the Trent and Mersey to the Staffs and Worcester, has an Anglo Welsh boatyard, BW water point and rubbish disposal and the boatyard has an Elsan disposal unit, which we’ve used in the past. They also sell diesel and coal, the latter of which we were desperately short of. There is room for about three boats at the water point, so it can be a bit tricky stopping there when it’s busy and we really weren’t looking forward to doing so.
But luck was on our side this morning when, much to our surprise and delight, who should appear coming towards us but the Coal Boat and its Butty. There are several of these boats cruising the waterways and we always try to buy from them rather than marinas, most of which can be quite a bit dearer. When they are fully laden they do sit pretty low in the water and, due to the weight they are towing, they move along very slowly, which is just as well because it can take some time to stop a load of several tonnes of coal at speed.
Anyway, we gave them a wave and shouted our order to them. Unfortunately the man was in some pain from broken ribs and was having some difficulty carrying the coal bags, and I could be no help with my knees and, with the towpath being mostly grass, bringing our trolley out would have been a waste of time, so he had to carry all four bags on his own. Still, he didn’t seem too upset about it and we parted in fine moods, especially us now that we only had to stop short of Great Haywood and walk our rubbish and Elsan down.
While Sheila walked around to the boatyard to empty our Elsan cassette, I dumped the rubbish in the bin. I then went looking for her but, since I had never used the Elsan unit before, I had no idea where it was. When she came back she told me that they now charge £1 for using it and, when she explained to the woman there that she hadn’t brought her purse with her, her reply was, “Well, you’ll just have to come back then, won’t you?” Miserable cow! Watch out for this one folks, she’s a meanie alright. As it happens, when Sheila mentioned this to one of their workmen, he said, “Forget it”, so we did. These boatyards don’t normally charge for this facility, especially if you are purchasing other goods, such as coal or diesel, so they must be feeling the economic pinch.
Thursday 13th October.
Today we are moving on to Bridge 69, another site that’s way off the beaten track, but at least we’ll be able to watch TV there. Would you believe it, last night we wanted to watch Midsomer Murders but, as is usual with these instances, the ITV channels were breaking up. However, all is not lost, because I know we have a strong Internet signal at bridge 69, so we can watch it on the laptop through ITV Player, so there!”
We are now only a week away from Mercia Marina and winter, so you won’t be receiving many more blogs. I have no idea how many of you actually read them, although I do have one or two followers, but whoever you are I hope you enjoy them, as boring as they seem to me. After all, what I put down here are just day to day happenings and, as you can see, they are sadly lacking in juicy tidbits.
Next year we should be able to introduce you to some new stretches of waterways, in particular the Kennett and Avon Canal which runs from the Thames to Bristol. From what we hear about this canal, it’s not been given much in the way of moorings, so we’re not expecting a particularly enjoyable ride. However, so long as the weather is in our favour we can always pull in to any old section of canal bank and put the plank out if necessary.
The Bristol Channel up to the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal should be pretty interesting too, seeing as how we’ll be paying about £160 for the use of a pilot to steer us around any obstacles.
Crossing the Ribble Link up in Lancashire is a two hour trip, so we’ve been told by somebody who did it this year, but that doesn’t involve a pilot, although we are obliged to wear life belts and must ensure our mobile phone is fully charged.
All in all 2012 should be interesting.
It is now almost 8.30 and whilst sitting here after breakfast, we spotted a few sheep wandering along the towpath. In fact there weren’t just a few, Wifey counted 16 altogether. The obvious thing to do in this situation is to try to locate a local farmer and advise him of the facts. I tried two different 118 numbers and finally came up with a number for a farm near Great Haywoood, about a mile away. This was after a complete failure by those 118 services to find a number anywhere near where we are.
So I telephone the number that they found, only to discover it was a rented property and not a working farm. What’s more, the lady who answered didn’t have a local phone book and could not help at all.
I next tried the Internet and found one near Great Haywood but, just as I was calling them, all those pesky sheep found their way back into the field. However, they had actually found their way back behind the fence separating the canal from the fields. They were not back in their own field and they now have ample opportunity to return to the towpath at any time.
I find it hard to believe that these 118 services are unable to find the number for a farm in this part of Staffordshire, goodness knows there are plenty of them on the map!!
Friday 14th October.
Today we’ll be making our way to Handsacre via Rugeley for shopping at Morrison’s and water top up. For the weekend we’ll probably stay at the top of the locks at Fradley Junction, move on to Alrewas on Monday, Branston Tuesday, Willington Wednesday where we’ll call in to the surgery to make appointments and finally, the marina on Thursday. And that, dear reader, will be that for this year.
Since there is no telling what exciting and stimulating happening may come our way during this last leg of our cruise, I’ll post this now and finish with blog number 33 when we get back to Mercia.
Cheers for now and have a good weekend.
Dave, Sheila and Rustydog!
Sunday, 9 October 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #31
Thursday 6th October.
We finally made it to Weston this morning and, by the time we arrived the wind was really picking up. However, with just three bars up on the dongle, I did at least manage to post the 30th blog of this trip.
This morning, even though the engine had been run for five hours yesterday, the batteries were down to 9.9 volts again and we didn’t bother watching TV last night. We did listen to the radio though, but that alone should not account for the drop in power overnight. I’m now beginning to wonder if we have an earth leak somewhere. I also think we should avail ourselves of a couple of days in Aston Marina on the way back from Stone. But, since we only have another two weeks before we’ll be in the marina at Willington, this would seem to be a waste of money.
I’m hoping the weather will be kind to us tomorrow morning, we really would prefer to get to Stone tomorrow and spend three nights there. We don’t yet know which day Alan and Chris are planning to visit, but we’re quite looking forward to meeting up again. If we can take a walk into town tomorrow morning we should be able to find a decent eatery to take them to for their lunch or evening meal.
Friday 7th October.
Yesterday afternoon I received a text message from my Alan asking me when we would be at Stone. Our plan was, as I explained to him, to be there for Friday through to Monday morning. Unfortunately, he said, they would not be able to meet us on Friday as they had urgent business to attend to. Neither could they meet us over the weekend, because they would be baby-sitting. So that would leave us with Monday.
Now, some time ago, I’m not sure when, but knowing that my brother Alan would not be able to meet us with the car until the third weekend of the month, we drew up plans that would take care of the extra week. Instead of turning right off the Coventry onto the Trent and Mersey heading for Mercia, we would turn left at Fradley Junction and head for Stone.
This would serve two purposes, we would have another week on the cut and we would guarantee meeting up with Alan and Chris before they return to Germany on the 15th. Of course, Alan and Chris would not have known this, all they knew was that we were heading for Stone and, since they knew they could get a bus there from Stoke, it offered them the same opportunity for us all to meet up. With hindsight I should have suggested the weekend, but that would have been too easy and cruising, in order to be fun, also has to be somewhat erratic.
So, all being well and assuming we are not obliged to cruise in foul weather, in which case all bets are off, we’ll meet on Monday.
Well, surprise, surprise, the weather has decided to stay nasty, thus preventing us from moving on today. I’m beginning to believe we should have returned to Mercia early and met up with Alan and Chris in Willington, or Derby. Still, it’s easy being wise with hindsight.
4 pm on the same day.
It has been persisting on and off for most of the day, but we at least managed to walk to and from the local shop without getting a soaking. Although somewhat late in the year, the weather is consistent with summer showers, rain one minute and sunshine the next. However, according to those nice weather people at the BBC the weekend should be much better.
We’ve now decided to leave overnight stays at Aston Marina altogether, but first we have to get to Stone, and it is six miles away with two locks to go through, which should take no more than 2½ hours. What chance of the rain holding off for that amount of time in the morning?
Saturday 8th October at 7 am and it is still breezy, but just a wee bit damp in the air. Whatever happens weather wise we have to get to Stone today, otherwise we may have a problem finding a mooring spot. Stone can be a pretty busy place for boaters.
Sunday 9th October.
Yesterday we were pretty lucky with the weather on our trip here to Stone. There are times on the cut where, due to the position of the boat in relation to the bends in the canal, it seems far windier than the tops of the trees would suggest, and Weston is one such place. Although the tree tops were virtually at a standstill, the water was moving quite strongly towards us, giving the impression of a strong head wind. But, once we moved off and rounded the first bend, there was hardly any wind at all. In fact we made it here to Stone with just a few drizzly spots of rain, and we made the six miles and two locks in just over two hours. Unfortunately, by the time we arrived and with it being Saturday, everyone and his uncle were already moored there, so we had to settle for a place right at the back end, which means a longer slog into town.
Now, I mentioned in an earlier blog, that we are in desperate need of a new radio/CD player. We also need a unit with which we can transfer our old vinyl to CDs. Yesterday we were presented with an opportunity to lay our hands on just such a unit, and not that thing that costs £200 either.
In the Saturday issue of the Daily Mail there was a copy of the Cooper’s of Stortford home shopping catalogue. On the back page is a music system that does vinyl recordings into MP3 format onto a memory stick. It is also has a radio and CD player and will sit nicely underneath our TV, which means we can do away with the radio/CD player in the cupboard. It also means that when we come across old vinyl records in charity shops; which we visit quite regularly to dispose of books; we’ll be able to buy them and convert to MP3. All we need to do then is transfer to laptop and copy to CDs. Terrific.
Oh! I forgot to mention the price, £69.99, the price of a new radio/CD player from Halford’s and that’s at the cheap end of the market. That’s one problem solved for the winter jobs to do.
Actually we have a multitude of jobs to do during our winter moorings, many of which I was unable to carry out whilst recovering from the knee op. Some of them, such as servicing of engine and heater system, can wait until we are ready to leave in March 2012. But much of the paintwork needs repairing, as does exterior woodwork after the effects of sun and rain. I also need to design and build a seating cum storage system on the stern that will give us comfortable seating whilst cruising and will enable us to store our tiller arm, windlasses and other bits and pieces that are currently stored inside the boat. We also need a telescopic clothes prop onto which we can mount the TV aerial, which will save climbing out of the boat as I do now.
Yesterday morning we took a stroll into Stone for shopping; just a few bits at the local Co-op; Sheila has taken a fancy to their 99 brand of de-caf tea and wanted to stock up before we get back to Willington. Fortunately we have a Cop-op at Willington too, though just how many boxes of 99 she’ll buy before we leave in March and, more importantly, where she’ll store them, I dread to think.
Tomorrow morning at about 11 o/clock we should be meeting up with Alan and Chris, who have both visited Stone in the past and know the layout pretty well. No doubt they’ll come back to the boat for a cuppa and a chat, after which we’ll probably stroll back into town for a lunch time feed.
For future reference and assuming the weather holds good, we’ll be heading back to Mercia on Tuesday morning.
Monday 10th October.
Yesterday morning, with nothing better to do with ourselves, we walked to Morrison’s for a few bits and pieces, and then, just for a laugh we did it again, only this time to the nearest pub, The Swan. After just one drink we fancied a change, so we walked through town to the Wetherspoon’s pub and discovered that their Guinness is the cheapest ever at just £2.75 per pint. What is more all their bitters are only £1.99 per pint. This begs the question, why are the other breweries not following suit? Even those pubs in the same locale as Wetherspoon’s are still charging way over the odds. If Alan and Chris are planning on dining out today I can see no reason not to go there for lunch, their food prices are very good too and some of them include a free drink.
I have been a silly little Billy! Something has been nagging at me since I ordered the music centre from Cooper’s on Saturday. Last night that something surfaced. This system records onto a memory stick in MP3 format which I thought I would be able to copy to my laptop and then onto CD. However, I remembered a customer of mine last year complaining that he was unable to play his language course on his car radio/CD player. I had to explain that he would need an MP3 player, because that is the format in which the language courses have been recorded.
So, after kicking myself up the you-know-what, out came the laptop and off went an email to Cooper’s, where I explained the problem and asked them to cancel the order. Luckily it was the weekend and the order had not been despatched yet. I’ll have to check later for a reply. Incidentally, Cooper’s do not have a 24 hour order service, despite what it tells you on the back of their catalogue. All you get when you phone out of hours is a message telling you their office hours of 10 am until 4 pm, or some such. You would think by now, that they would have engaged the services of a telephone ordering service by now.
Now, if anybody out there knows of a relatively inexpensive unit that will record old vinyl onto CD, and I don’t mean that £200 job, I’d love to hear from you. Alternatively, if you know how to convert MP3 to CD format, that would also be good, because I could then cancel my cancelled order!
Stone is a rather erratic location for Internet access, one minute five bars, the next it’s down to three, but I’m going to try posting this blog now, simply because I won’t have another opportunity until Tuesday, and goodness knows where we’ll be on that day.
Cheers for now from,
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
We finally made it to Weston this morning and, by the time we arrived the wind was really picking up. However, with just three bars up on the dongle, I did at least manage to post the 30th blog of this trip.
This morning, even though the engine had been run for five hours yesterday, the batteries were down to 9.9 volts again and we didn’t bother watching TV last night. We did listen to the radio though, but that alone should not account for the drop in power overnight. I’m now beginning to wonder if we have an earth leak somewhere. I also think we should avail ourselves of a couple of days in Aston Marina on the way back from Stone. But, since we only have another two weeks before we’ll be in the marina at Willington, this would seem to be a waste of money.
I’m hoping the weather will be kind to us tomorrow morning, we really would prefer to get to Stone tomorrow and spend three nights there. We don’t yet know which day Alan and Chris are planning to visit, but we’re quite looking forward to meeting up again. If we can take a walk into town tomorrow morning we should be able to find a decent eatery to take them to for their lunch or evening meal.
Friday 7th October.
Yesterday afternoon I received a text message from my Alan asking me when we would be at Stone. Our plan was, as I explained to him, to be there for Friday through to Monday morning. Unfortunately, he said, they would not be able to meet us on Friday as they had urgent business to attend to. Neither could they meet us over the weekend, because they would be baby-sitting. So that would leave us with Monday.
Now, some time ago, I’m not sure when, but knowing that my brother Alan would not be able to meet us with the car until the third weekend of the month, we drew up plans that would take care of the extra week. Instead of turning right off the Coventry onto the Trent and Mersey heading for Mercia, we would turn left at Fradley Junction and head for Stone.
This would serve two purposes, we would have another week on the cut and we would guarantee meeting up with Alan and Chris before they return to Germany on the 15th. Of course, Alan and Chris would not have known this, all they knew was that we were heading for Stone and, since they knew they could get a bus there from Stoke, it offered them the same opportunity for us all to meet up. With hindsight I should have suggested the weekend, but that would have been too easy and cruising, in order to be fun, also has to be somewhat erratic.
So, all being well and assuming we are not obliged to cruise in foul weather, in which case all bets are off, we’ll meet on Monday.
Well, surprise, surprise, the weather has decided to stay nasty, thus preventing us from moving on today. I’m beginning to believe we should have returned to Mercia early and met up with Alan and Chris in Willington, or Derby. Still, it’s easy being wise with hindsight.
4 pm on the same day.
It has been persisting on and off for most of the day, but we at least managed to walk to and from the local shop without getting a soaking. Although somewhat late in the year, the weather is consistent with summer showers, rain one minute and sunshine the next. However, according to those nice weather people at the BBC the weekend should be much better.
We’ve now decided to leave overnight stays at Aston Marina altogether, but first we have to get to Stone, and it is six miles away with two locks to go through, which should take no more than 2½ hours. What chance of the rain holding off for that amount of time in the morning?
Saturday 8th October at 7 am and it is still breezy, but just a wee bit damp in the air. Whatever happens weather wise we have to get to Stone today, otherwise we may have a problem finding a mooring spot. Stone can be a pretty busy place for boaters.
Sunday 9th October.
Yesterday we were pretty lucky with the weather on our trip here to Stone. There are times on the cut where, due to the position of the boat in relation to the bends in the canal, it seems far windier than the tops of the trees would suggest, and Weston is one such place. Although the tree tops were virtually at a standstill, the water was moving quite strongly towards us, giving the impression of a strong head wind. But, once we moved off and rounded the first bend, there was hardly any wind at all. In fact we made it here to Stone with just a few drizzly spots of rain, and we made the six miles and two locks in just over two hours. Unfortunately, by the time we arrived and with it being Saturday, everyone and his uncle were already moored there, so we had to settle for a place right at the back end, which means a longer slog into town.
Now, I mentioned in an earlier blog, that we are in desperate need of a new radio/CD player. We also need a unit with which we can transfer our old vinyl to CDs. Yesterday we were presented with an opportunity to lay our hands on just such a unit, and not that thing that costs £200 either.
In the Saturday issue of the Daily Mail there was a copy of the Cooper’s of Stortford home shopping catalogue. On the back page is a music system that does vinyl recordings into MP3 format onto a memory stick. It is also has a radio and CD player and will sit nicely underneath our TV, which means we can do away with the radio/CD player in the cupboard. It also means that when we come across old vinyl records in charity shops; which we visit quite regularly to dispose of books; we’ll be able to buy them and convert to MP3. All we need to do then is transfer to laptop and copy to CDs. Terrific.
Oh! I forgot to mention the price, £69.99, the price of a new radio/CD player from Halford’s and that’s at the cheap end of the market. That’s one problem solved for the winter jobs to do.
Actually we have a multitude of jobs to do during our winter moorings, many of which I was unable to carry out whilst recovering from the knee op. Some of them, such as servicing of engine and heater system, can wait until we are ready to leave in March 2012. But much of the paintwork needs repairing, as does exterior woodwork after the effects of sun and rain. I also need to design and build a seating cum storage system on the stern that will give us comfortable seating whilst cruising and will enable us to store our tiller arm, windlasses and other bits and pieces that are currently stored inside the boat. We also need a telescopic clothes prop onto which we can mount the TV aerial, which will save climbing out of the boat as I do now.
Yesterday morning we took a stroll into Stone for shopping; just a few bits at the local Co-op; Sheila has taken a fancy to their 99 brand of de-caf tea and wanted to stock up before we get back to Willington. Fortunately we have a Cop-op at Willington too, though just how many boxes of 99 she’ll buy before we leave in March and, more importantly, where she’ll store them, I dread to think.
Tomorrow morning at about 11 o/clock we should be meeting up with Alan and Chris, who have both visited Stone in the past and know the layout pretty well. No doubt they’ll come back to the boat for a cuppa and a chat, after which we’ll probably stroll back into town for a lunch time feed.
For future reference and assuming the weather holds good, we’ll be heading back to Mercia on Tuesday morning.
Monday 10th October.
Yesterday morning, with nothing better to do with ourselves, we walked to Morrison’s for a few bits and pieces, and then, just for a laugh we did it again, only this time to the nearest pub, The Swan. After just one drink we fancied a change, so we walked through town to the Wetherspoon’s pub and discovered that their Guinness is the cheapest ever at just £2.75 per pint. What is more all their bitters are only £1.99 per pint. This begs the question, why are the other breweries not following suit? Even those pubs in the same locale as Wetherspoon’s are still charging way over the odds. If Alan and Chris are planning on dining out today I can see no reason not to go there for lunch, their food prices are very good too and some of them include a free drink.
I have been a silly little Billy! Something has been nagging at me since I ordered the music centre from Cooper’s on Saturday. Last night that something surfaced. This system records onto a memory stick in MP3 format which I thought I would be able to copy to my laptop and then onto CD. However, I remembered a customer of mine last year complaining that he was unable to play his language course on his car radio/CD player. I had to explain that he would need an MP3 player, because that is the format in which the language courses have been recorded.
So, after kicking myself up the you-know-what, out came the laptop and off went an email to Cooper’s, where I explained the problem and asked them to cancel the order. Luckily it was the weekend and the order had not been despatched yet. I’ll have to check later for a reply. Incidentally, Cooper’s do not have a 24 hour order service, despite what it tells you on the back of their catalogue. All you get when you phone out of hours is a message telling you their office hours of 10 am until 4 pm, or some such. You would think by now, that they would have engaged the services of a telephone ordering service by now.
Now, if anybody out there knows of a relatively inexpensive unit that will record old vinyl onto CD, and I don’t mean that £200 job, I’d love to hear from you. Alternatively, if you know how to convert MP3 to CD format, that would also be good, because I could then cancel my cancelled order!
Stone is a rather erratic location for Internet access, one minute five bars, the next it’s down to three, but I’m going to try posting this blog now, simply because I won’t have another opportunity until Tuesday, and goodness knows where we’ll be on that day.
Cheers for now from,
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
Thursday, 6 October 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #30
Wednesday 28th September.
Yesterday morning we moved on from the bottom of lock 9 to Polesworth, where, after a quick cuppa, we set of for the local health centre, only to discover that it is closed on Tuesday mornings. So, since we needed a prescription each, we did a bit of shopping, walked back to the boat and had a spot of lunch.
About 2 pm we again made our way to the health centre, by which time my legs, from my knees to the bottoms of my feet, were really giving me gyp. The knees still tend to ache on most walks, as do my calf muscles. My feet don’t just ache, they are a constant source of discomfort, even in bed. By the time we arrived at the centre in this belated summer heat-wave, I was really pooped and not in the brightest of moods.
To be told by the receptionist that, ‘because you are temporary patients, you will have to book an appointment for tomorrow’, came as something of a blow, not to mention a bloody insult. Are our needs of less importance than those of the patients on their list? It’s not as if they were busy, with only a handful of patients waiting there.
Anyway, at this explanation for having to wait for the morrow, just to spend five minutes waiting for a doctor to write up a prescription, I blew up, raised my hands in the air and stormed off in high dudgeon. Wifey was not best pleased at my behaviour, but I was even less pleased at the mere idea that I should have to walk into that village for a third time.
This morning we girded our loins and headed for Hopwas, a distance of eight miles, with two locks along the way. With the amount of boats moored up over such a distance, our progress was rather slow, with the whole trip taking almost four hours.
Fortunately, although it is very warm outside, there is a cool breeze blowing through the boat, so I am able to sit here and bring this blog up to date. Goodness knows what temperatures you are enduring down south!
Tomorrow we will head for Whittington, just three miles away, where we will enjoy a pub lunch. I’m quite looking forward to sitting under a parasol and enjoying a drink of Stella and a light lunch. Yes, Stella, Guinness is a wee bit heavy in this weather.
Saturday 1st October.
Sad to say the pub lunch at Whittington did not materialise, mainly because The Swan had been closed down. This is not the first time we have seen the demise of a local. The Swan though, with its huge catchments area, came as a bit of a surprise. Actually, we took a walk into Whittington and found another pub, but it didn’t do food, so we didn’t bother.
Now, just before setting off from Whittington yesterday morning, along came a boat with another in tow. Since they were crawling along at tick-over speed this did not bode well for our trip to Fradley. So, while we were giving them time to get a couple of miles ahead of us, Wifey popped into the village for milk, bread and a paper.
Not wishing to catch up to the crawlers in front we took our time heading for the junction. We needn’t have worried though because said crawlers had pulled in about a mile ahead. But, having sauntered along for the first mile, we sauntered along for the other four, completing the trip in two hours. And very pleasant it was too. Of course this Indian summer can’t last for much longer, but it is at least saving on coal.
Incidentally, I told you in the last blog, that we would be heading up the Birmingham and Fazely Canal, which would have meant turning left at Fazely Junction and spending a couple of days at the water park. However, in view of our shortage of medication we decided against this and continued along the Coventry Canal instead.
So, having digressed somewhat, back to Fradley Junction where we enjoyed a pub lunch at The Swan. They do a rather good Hot Pork Baguette and, much to my surprise, having forgotten our last visit, they also have Murphy’s Stout on tap. (There are times when a poor memory is not an altogether bad thing!)
Today, after disposing of rubbish and topping up with water, we will be heading for Handsacre, where we will stay for the weekend. Here we have The Crown, which is beside the canal, and The Old Peculiar, which is a short walk into the village.
This fine weather is still holding up and looks set to stay until Monday or Tuesday of next week. We have heard that snow will soon be on its way. Hmmm! Can’t say I like that idea much.
Sunday 2nd October.
Now, after five years on the cut and having already visited the majority of places mentioned in this year’s blogs, I still have problems remembering what they look like before we arrive. Wifey tries her best to explain the appearance of these places, even to the extent of showing me in one of the guide books, but she’s not always successful. I suppose I must blame this on my old memory, but it really is a darn nuisance.
Anyway, having arrived at Handsacre I immediately recognised the moorings, but until we walked to the local shops their location and that of the pubs was lost to me. No matter, I now know which pub of the two we used on our last visit, The Old Peculiar.
The reason for this preference is that we don’t like Sky TV in pubs and The Crown has just that. In order to attract the paying public some establishments seem to think all punters love football. Neither of us can stand the wretched game much less have it shoved down our throats when we’re trying to enjoy a quiet drink. Yesterday the Crown was showing the local derby of Everton and Liverpool at lunchtime and followed that in the evening with another match. Too much!
The pub we normally use in Findern, just up the road from Mercia Marina, also has Sky, but the sound is turned off on Sunday lunchtime, so that’s alright then.
Sunday lunch for us was, until we took to the water, a simple matter of a couple of drinks in the local followed by a late roast at about six p.m. Over the years since buying the boat we have found our appetites diminishing somewhat, to the extent that we very rarely bother with a full roast dinner. And this doesn’t only apply to Sundays, we now prefer much smaller meals and tend to shun red meat for the rest of the time too. We are quite likely to snack these days on meals such as baked potato or pasta as anything else, besides which where most people consider midday or 1 pm to be the right time for a main meal on Sunday, we have always kept to the same time as mid-week, about 6 p.m.
However, since we’ll be heading back this way once we have met up with Alan and Chris, we have vowed to stop at Handsacre again to sample an evening meal at The Old Peculiar. The prices look good at about £5.95 and the place is very comfortable and clean.
Whilst sitting there this afternoon I spotted some framed cartoons on the wall opposite and went to investigate. They turned out to be all about motor bikes and were drawn by a chap called P. Wilford. Having enquired at the bar about this person, I was told by a customer that the man responsible for putting them there was the manager and that he was sitting outside in the garden. So, leaving Wifey to fend for herself I popped out to have a chat.
Being a biker himself and deciding several years before to remove the pool table and turn the area into seating, he looked around on eBay for something suitable for adorning the walls and found these cartoons. The pictures were drawn in the late ‘80s and early ’90s and, from what the manager told me, Mr. Wilford also drew cartoons of other subjects. I must investigate further.
Monday 3rd October.
Aha, the weather has changed already, well, it has up here. Last night we saw the first drop of rain for quite a while but, when June phoned to be reminded of our blog address – her computer has crashed – she asked if we could send the rain down to Harlow. She doesn’t like the stifling heat any more than I do. Wifey seems impervious to any kind of weather and could probably live in an igloo or mud hut in the desert with no detrimental effect.
Today we have set our sights on Rugeley where there is a Morrisson’s store and a Wilkinson’s. Not that we need much by way of shopping will only be stopping for bread and the paper, and dispose of some of our books to a charity shop. After that we’ll be off to moorings out in the boondocks for the rest of the day and night.
Right now would be a good time to advise you all of our planned route for 2012, which will take in a lot of new territory and cover many more miles than this year has. Indeed, it will be more like our first year out at about 750 miles.
Just briefly so as not to bore you too much, we’ll be heading south to Oxford where we’ll take the River Thames to Reading and the top of the Kennett and Avon canal and on down to Bristol.
From Bristol we intend taking the Bristol Channel up to the Gloucester and Sharpness canal which, in turn will take us on to the River Severn and Stourport where we’ll join the Staffs and Worcester canal and head north.
Following the Staffs and Worcester, the Shroppie, the Bridgewater and the Leeds and Liverpool canals, we’ll arrive in the big city of Liverpool. After a few days seeing the sights of this City of Culture, we’ll head on up to the River Ribble and cross the Ribble Link to the Lancaster canal and on to its furthest reach, when we’ll make our way back to the Trent and Mersey and back to Mercia for the winter.
We reckon we will have to cruise an average of 3 or 4 miles per day in order to eke the trip out for seven months, which will give us plenty of time for two day stopovers wherever we like. So, lots of new experiences, especially along the Kennett and Avon where the moorings are in short supply and where we will have to pass through 29 locks at Devizes, all at one go. That’ll be fun! We have lots of planning to do this winter.
Tuesday 4th October.
The weather has finally changed for the worse, lots of high wind and heavy cloud yesterday afternoon and evening, although the wind has died down this morning. Hopefully it won’t be too fierce on our three mile trip to Great Haywood where, after phoning the surgery yesterday, we will have to book ourselves in and arrange for prescriptions. I was told that Sheila will be able to return in the afternoon to collect them, but I have my doubts.
This morning, despite our panel showing 12.1 volts, the pesky heater refused to start up and with the drop in temperature overnight it was a wee bit chilly in here. Still, boiling the kettle and turning the oven on for a short spell solved the problem. It looks like we’ll have to get the fire started again. Goodness knows what the voltage is at this minute, I daren’t look, but our lights are getting dimmer by the minute. There are times when this 8 am restriction to running of engines can be a darn nuisance.
Actually, I sat and worked out what the problem is with the voltage drop. Our original batteries, of which we had six domestic, were 135 Ampere Hour, giving a total of 810 when fully charged. When we asked Linden to replace them with four new ones he installed the 115 A/H rated ones, thus reducing the available storage to just 460 A/Hours. No wonder we’re having problems. Indeed, we currently have just over half the power available to what we had after adding two more batteries on our first trip out way back in 2007. When we add two more later this year we’ll still only have 80% of the previous available power. My fault entirely of course, I should have insisted on like for like.
15.30 same day.
We left our moorings at bridge 69 at 09.00 and managed the three miles and one lock to Great Haywood in about 1½ hours. Our only reason for stopping here is to pay a visit to the local surgery, and what a difference that was compared to Polesworth. I gave them a call as soon as we arrived and explained our situation and was assured that all we had to do was pop into the surgery, fill in the usual forms and all would be taken care of. The prescriptions would be made up for the next morning and the medication prepared at their own dispensary. All we need to do is walk into the village in the morning and we’ll be on our way before lunchtime.
Now, as we seem to be experiencing problems with batteries, I also phoned the nearest marina and asked about mooring up there for a couple of nights. The very pleasant lady I spoke to assured me that somebody would return my call asap. They didn’t, so I called again about an hour later. The same lady referred back to the other person and again said they would call me back. They still haven’t done so. I can’t imagine their business is doing too well if this is how they treat enquirers about one of their services.
I had hoped to post this blog today but unfortunately the signal is very poor here. This is because we are below the lock, whereas the last time we moored here we were above it. However, since keeping records of signal strength on this trip, I do know that the signal is OK at Weston, but I will have to tie my dongle to a stick and erect it on the roof. Hmmm! I’m not sure I like the sound of that. Could be painful.
Wednesday 5th October.
Occasionally, when we’ve had poor Internet signal late in the day, I find it can pick up enough the following morning to access the WWW. Sadly, at 5.20 this morning this is not the case, so I won’t be posting this just yet.
5.30 pm the same day.
Well, we’re still here at Great Haywood and won’t be moving on until tomorrow, and that assumes the weather is kind to us. We had hoped to be in Weston by now, but we don’t cruise in high winds, and that’s what we’ve had all day today.
This morning at about 11 o/clock we walked in to the surgery, our prescriptions were already made up and ready at the dispensary. It seems that if a rural practice has patients living three miles or more away they are entitled to have their own dispensary, even if there is a local pharmacy that dispenses prescriptions. Not a lot of people know that!
The trouble with Great Haywood, as we discovered earlier in the year, is that it’s virtually impossible to pick up TV or Internet, especially below the lock, which is where we are at present. Still, no matter, there’s not much worth watching on TV and I have nothing important to carry out on line, except to post this blog which is already 10 pages long. Hopefully we’ll make it to Weston tomorrow morning.
Thursday 6th October.
It’s Valerie’s 65th birthday today, hope you had a good one. I say ‘had’, because I have no idea when I’ll be able to post this blog. I’ve already cut out much of the rubbish but it’s still going to be over 10 pages long.
Planning is one thing, doing is quite another. Yesterday was a really godawful day in terms of weather, nothing but high winds and, later in the afternoon, plenty of rain and it continued throughout the night. Being moored under an oak tree does make life interesting, with acorns and small branches falling onto the boat, not to mention the bird pooh, which I’m very wary of treading in first thing in the morning. They are not small birds either, probably the size of vultures judging by the lumps.
Thankfully the high winds have now dropped and so has the rain, so we should be able to make our way to Weston. With all the holiday traffic still making its way up and down this canal, I’m looking for an early start this morning. There’s not a lot of space at the junction, which is where we really need to stop and dispose of rubbish and top up with water. We won’t get another chance until we get to Stone, and we will have to wait until Monday morning, when we’ll turn the boat around and head back to Mercia.
Hallelujah brother, we’re at Weston now and I can get trhee bars up on the dongle. So, here goes nothing, let’s post this humongous blog!! Yeah!!
All abreast from Dave, Sheila and Rusty, our long suffering pooch, bless her cotton socks
Yesterday morning we moved on from the bottom of lock 9 to Polesworth, where, after a quick cuppa, we set of for the local health centre, only to discover that it is closed on Tuesday mornings. So, since we needed a prescription each, we did a bit of shopping, walked back to the boat and had a spot of lunch.
About 2 pm we again made our way to the health centre, by which time my legs, from my knees to the bottoms of my feet, were really giving me gyp. The knees still tend to ache on most walks, as do my calf muscles. My feet don’t just ache, they are a constant source of discomfort, even in bed. By the time we arrived at the centre in this belated summer heat-wave, I was really pooped and not in the brightest of moods.
To be told by the receptionist that, ‘because you are temporary patients, you will have to book an appointment for tomorrow’, came as something of a blow, not to mention a bloody insult. Are our needs of less importance than those of the patients on their list? It’s not as if they were busy, with only a handful of patients waiting there.
Anyway, at this explanation for having to wait for the morrow, just to spend five minutes waiting for a doctor to write up a prescription, I blew up, raised my hands in the air and stormed off in high dudgeon. Wifey was not best pleased at my behaviour, but I was even less pleased at the mere idea that I should have to walk into that village for a third time.
This morning we girded our loins and headed for Hopwas, a distance of eight miles, with two locks along the way. With the amount of boats moored up over such a distance, our progress was rather slow, with the whole trip taking almost four hours.
Fortunately, although it is very warm outside, there is a cool breeze blowing through the boat, so I am able to sit here and bring this blog up to date. Goodness knows what temperatures you are enduring down south!
Tomorrow we will head for Whittington, just three miles away, where we will enjoy a pub lunch. I’m quite looking forward to sitting under a parasol and enjoying a drink of Stella and a light lunch. Yes, Stella, Guinness is a wee bit heavy in this weather.
Saturday 1st October.
Sad to say the pub lunch at Whittington did not materialise, mainly because The Swan had been closed down. This is not the first time we have seen the demise of a local. The Swan though, with its huge catchments area, came as a bit of a surprise. Actually, we took a walk into Whittington and found another pub, but it didn’t do food, so we didn’t bother.
Now, just before setting off from Whittington yesterday morning, along came a boat with another in tow. Since they were crawling along at tick-over speed this did not bode well for our trip to Fradley. So, while we were giving them time to get a couple of miles ahead of us, Wifey popped into the village for milk, bread and a paper.
Not wishing to catch up to the crawlers in front we took our time heading for the junction. We needn’t have worried though because said crawlers had pulled in about a mile ahead. But, having sauntered along for the first mile, we sauntered along for the other four, completing the trip in two hours. And very pleasant it was too. Of course this Indian summer can’t last for much longer, but it is at least saving on coal.
Incidentally, I told you in the last blog, that we would be heading up the Birmingham and Fazely Canal, which would have meant turning left at Fazely Junction and spending a couple of days at the water park. However, in view of our shortage of medication we decided against this and continued along the Coventry Canal instead.
So, having digressed somewhat, back to Fradley Junction where we enjoyed a pub lunch at The Swan. They do a rather good Hot Pork Baguette and, much to my surprise, having forgotten our last visit, they also have Murphy’s Stout on tap. (There are times when a poor memory is not an altogether bad thing!)
Today, after disposing of rubbish and topping up with water, we will be heading for Handsacre, where we will stay for the weekend. Here we have The Crown, which is beside the canal, and The Old Peculiar, which is a short walk into the village.
This fine weather is still holding up and looks set to stay until Monday or Tuesday of next week. We have heard that snow will soon be on its way. Hmmm! Can’t say I like that idea much.
Sunday 2nd October.
Now, after five years on the cut and having already visited the majority of places mentioned in this year’s blogs, I still have problems remembering what they look like before we arrive. Wifey tries her best to explain the appearance of these places, even to the extent of showing me in one of the guide books, but she’s not always successful. I suppose I must blame this on my old memory, but it really is a darn nuisance.
Anyway, having arrived at Handsacre I immediately recognised the moorings, but until we walked to the local shops their location and that of the pubs was lost to me. No matter, I now know which pub of the two we used on our last visit, The Old Peculiar.
The reason for this preference is that we don’t like Sky TV in pubs and The Crown has just that. In order to attract the paying public some establishments seem to think all punters love football. Neither of us can stand the wretched game much less have it shoved down our throats when we’re trying to enjoy a quiet drink. Yesterday the Crown was showing the local derby of Everton and Liverpool at lunchtime and followed that in the evening with another match. Too much!
The pub we normally use in Findern, just up the road from Mercia Marina, also has Sky, but the sound is turned off on Sunday lunchtime, so that’s alright then.
Sunday lunch for us was, until we took to the water, a simple matter of a couple of drinks in the local followed by a late roast at about six p.m. Over the years since buying the boat we have found our appetites diminishing somewhat, to the extent that we very rarely bother with a full roast dinner. And this doesn’t only apply to Sundays, we now prefer much smaller meals and tend to shun red meat for the rest of the time too. We are quite likely to snack these days on meals such as baked potato or pasta as anything else, besides which where most people consider midday or 1 pm to be the right time for a main meal on Sunday, we have always kept to the same time as mid-week, about 6 p.m.
However, since we’ll be heading back this way once we have met up with Alan and Chris, we have vowed to stop at Handsacre again to sample an evening meal at The Old Peculiar. The prices look good at about £5.95 and the place is very comfortable and clean.
Whilst sitting there this afternoon I spotted some framed cartoons on the wall opposite and went to investigate. They turned out to be all about motor bikes and were drawn by a chap called P. Wilford. Having enquired at the bar about this person, I was told by a customer that the man responsible for putting them there was the manager and that he was sitting outside in the garden. So, leaving Wifey to fend for herself I popped out to have a chat.
Being a biker himself and deciding several years before to remove the pool table and turn the area into seating, he looked around on eBay for something suitable for adorning the walls and found these cartoons. The pictures were drawn in the late ‘80s and early ’90s and, from what the manager told me, Mr. Wilford also drew cartoons of other subjects. I must investigate further.
Monday 3rd October.
Aha, the weather has changed already, well, it has up here. Last night we saw the first drop of rain for quite a while but, when June phoned to be reminded of our blog address – her computer has crashed – she asked if we could send the rain down to Harlow. She doesn’t like the stifling heat any more than I do. Wifey seems impervious to any kind of weather and could probably live in an igloo or mud hut in the desert with no detrimental effect.
Today we have set our sights on Rugeley where there is a Morrisson’s store and a Wilkinson’s. Not that we need much by way of shopping will only be stopping for bread and the paper, and dispose of some of our books to a charity shop. After that we’ll be off to moorings out in the boondocks for the rest of the day and night.
Right now would be a good time to advise you all of our planned route for 2012, which will take in a lot of new territory and cover many more miles than this year has. Indeed, it will be more like our first year out at about 750 miles.
Just briefly so as not to bore you too much, we’ll be heading south to Oxford where we’ll take the River Thames to Reading and the top of the Kennett and Avon canal and on down to Bristol.
From Bristol we intend taking the Bristol Channel up to the Gloucester and Sharpness canal which, in turn will take us on to the River Severn and Stourport where we’ll join the Staffs and Worcester canal and head north.
Following the Staffs and Worcester, the Shroppie, the Bridgewater and the Leeds and Liverpool canals, we’ll arrive in the big city of Liverpool. After a few days seeing the sights of this City of Culture, we’ll head on up to the River Ribble and cross the Ribble Link to the Lancaster canal and on to its furthest reach, when we’ll make our way back to the Trent and Mersey and back to Mercia for the winter.
We reckon we will have to cruise an average of 3 or 4 miles per day in order to eke the trip out for seven months, which will give us plenty of time for two day stopovers wherever we like. So, lots of new experiences, especially along the Kennett and Avon where the moorings are in short supply and where we will have to pass through 29 locks at Devizes, all at one go. That’ll be fun! We have lots of planning to do this winter.
Tuesday 4th October.
The weather has finally changed for the worse, lots of high wind and heavy cloud yesterday afternoon and evening, although the wind has died down this morning. Hopefully it won’t be too fierce on our three mile trip to Great Haywood where, after phoning the surgery yesterday, we will have to book ourselves in and arrange for prescriptions. I was told that Sheila will be able to return in the afternoon to collect them, but I have my doubts.
This morning, despite our panel showing 12.1 volts, the pesky heater refused to start up and with the drop in temperature overnight it was a wee bit chilly in here. Still, boiling the kettle and turning the oven on for a short spell solved the problem. It looks like we’ll have to get the fire started again. Goodness knows what the voltage is at this minute, I daren’t look, but our lights are getting dimmer by the minute. There are times when this 8 am restriction to running of engines can be a darn nuisance.
Actually, I sat and worked out what the problem is with the voltage drop. Our original batteries, of which we had six domestic, were 135 Ampere Hour, giving a total of 810 when fully charged. When we asked Linden to replace them with four new ones he installed the 115 A/H rated ones, thus reducing the available storage to just 460 A/Hours. No wonder we’re having problems. Indeed, we currently have just over half the power available to what we had after adding two more batteries on our first trip out way back in 2007. When we add two more later this year we’ll still only have 80% of the previous available power. My fault entirely of course, I should have insisted on like for like.
15.30 same day.
We left our moorings at bridge 69 at 09.00 and managed the three miles and one lock to Great Haywood in about 1½ hours. Our only reason for stopping here is to pay a visit to the local surgery, and what a difference that was compared to Polesworth. I gave them a call as soon as we arrived and explained our situation and was assured that all we had to do was pop into the surgery, fill in the usual forms and all would be taken care of. The prescriptions would be made up for the next morning and the medication prepared at their own dispensary. All we need to do is walk into the village in the morning and we’ll be on our way before lunchtime.
Now, as we seem to be experiencing problems with batteries, I also phoned the nearest marina and asked about mooring up there for a couple of nights. The very pleasant lady I spoke to assured me that somebody would return my call asap. They didn’t, so I called again about an hour later. The same lady referred back to the other person and again said they would call me back. They still haven’t done so. I can’t imagine their business is doing too well if this is how they treat enquirers about one of their services.
I had hoped to post this blog today but unfortunately the signal is very poor here. This is because we are below the lock, whereas the last time we moored here we were above it. However, since keeping records of signal strength on this trip, I do know that the signal is OK at Weston, but I will have to tie my dongle to a stick and erect it on the roof. Hmmm! I’m not sure I like the sound of that. Could be painful.
Wednesday 5th October.
Occasionally, when we’ve had poor Internet signal late in the day, I find it can pick up enough the following morning to access the WWW. Sadly, at 5.20 this morning this is not the case, so I won’t be posting this just yet.
5.30 pm the same day.
Well, we’re still here at Great Haywood and won’t be moving on until tomorrow, and that assumes the weather is kind to us. We had hoped to be in Weston by now, but we don’t cruise in high winds, and that’s what we’ve had all day today.
This morning at about 11 o/clock we walked in to the surgery, our prescriptions were already made up and ready at the dispensary. It seems that if a rural practice has patients living three miles or more away they are entitled to have their own dispensary, even if there is a local pharmacy that dispenses prescriptions. Not a lot of people know that!
The trouble with Great Haywood, as we discovered earlier in the year, is that it’s virtually impossible to pick up TV or Internet, especially below the lock, which is where we are at present. Still, no matter, there’s not much worth watching on TV and I have nothing important to carry out on line, except to post this blog which is already 10 pages long. Hopefully we’ll make it to Weston tomorrow morning.
Thursday 6th October.
It’s Valerie’s 65th birthday today, hope you had a good one. I say ‘had’, because I have no idea when I’ll be able to post this blog. I’ve already cut out much of the rubbish but it’s still going to be over 10 pages long.
Planning is one thing, doing is quite another. Yesterday was a really godawful day in terms of weather, nothing but high winds and, later in the afternoon, plenty of rain and it continued throughout the night. Being moored under an oak tree does make life interesting, with acorns and small branches falling onto the boat, not to mention the bird pooh, which I’m very wary of treading in first thing in the morning. They are not small birds either, probably the size of vultures judging by the lumps.
Thankfully the high winds have now dropped and so has the rain, so we should be able to make our way to Weston. With all the holiday traffic still making its way up and down this canal, I’m looking for an early start this morning. There’s not a lot of space at the junction, which is where we really need to stop and dispose of rubbish and top up with water. We won’t get another chance until we get to Stone, and we will have to wait until Monday morning, when we’ll turn the boat around and head back to Mercia.
Hallelujah brother, we’re at Weston now and I can get trhee bars up on the dongle. So, here goes nothing, let’s post this humongous blog!! Yeah!!
All abreast from Dave, Sheila and Rusty, our long suffering pooch, bless her cotton socks
Monday, 26 September 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #29
Sunday 18th September
About 3½ miles away from Market Bosworth, on the way back to the Coventry Canal, is Sutton Wharf, which has 48 hour moorings, a café and an Elsan disposal unit. The weather just now, at almost 7 am, is calm and sunny. Well, it will be when the sun comes up, so that is where we will head for after breakfast.
About 2½ miles further on is Stoke Golding, a small village that boasts three pubs. So, if we are unable to moor up at the café, we’ll move on to S.G. and enjoy our usual Sunday drink there.
Alternatively of course, we could simply stay here for another day and move on tomorrow, when there is much more likelihood of us finding moorings at Stoke Golding. Who knows? Baffled? Me too!
Saturday, apart from Wifey taking a walk into town and me having my monthly strip wash, nothing exciting occurred. However, we were set upon by some really heavy rain and hail stones later in the afternoon. Hopefully that’s all over now and we’ll be able to enjoy a much warmer day.
Monday 19th September
Yesterday we actually cruised through to Stoke Golding after stopping at off at Sutton Wharf, where we would have stayed overnight had there been any space. As it turned out though, the cruise to Stoke Golding was the right choice, since there was more than enough space to accommodate us.
On our last visit here 4 years ago the White Swan wasn’t open at lunchtime but, with it being a Sunday this time around, it was and so we spent a very pleasant hour there. Looking across at the table next to ours we were surprised to see the size of the meals they were enjoying. The price for their two-course Sunday lunch was just £5.95. Sadly I am currently unable to devour such a meal these days, more’s the pity. Indeed, we rarely eat more than a snack on Sundays now, simply because we don’t have the capacity for full blown roasts any more.
We took the bus into Nuneaton this morning and were surprised at the range of shops there. Unlike many other towns of similar size, not all of the supermarkets were out of town, the Asda store here is pretty big and we will try to pay it a visit within the next few days. Hopefully we’ll be moored at Lime Kilns soon and should be able to catch a bus into town again from there.
Tuesday 20th September
Judging by the weather we won’t be going very far. Although it isn’t raining yet, there is a pretty strong wind, which is not conducive to pleasant cruising. It may be just a case of Wifey trotting off for the paper and cruising to the next available mooring spot. We will see and you will be informed of our progress, or lack of.
Wednesday 21st September.
Yesterday, having spent two days at Stoke Golding, and despite the strong wind and threat of rain, we decided to make our way towards Lime Kilns. Sadly the threatened rain did more than threaten, so we pulled in and moored up at bridge 23, about a mile away and a total of 30 minutes cruising. With no prospect of the day brightening up, we decided to stay put for the day.
This morning is calm with a thick cloud cover, but there are signs that the clouds are now breaking up, so we should be on our way later.
Thursday 22nd September.
We took ourselves for a stroll to the nearest garage for the paper this morning but, sadly, no bus stops in sight, so no trip into Nuneaton today. Instead we’ll top up with water and make our way to Bulkington and the Corner House pub, which we called into on our way through. At the time we weren’t really up for a pub lunch, but this time we’ll give them a try. The moorings there are pretty sparse, with room for only three boats and it’s really a case of timing the arrival at such places. Get there too early, say, between 9 and 10 am, and those lazy holidaymakers will probably still be eating breakfast, any time after 10 and we might just be lucky.
17.00 same day.
We finally made it to Bulkington at about 10.45 this morning and found, much to our surprise and delight, that there was plenty of room to moor up. Just as well really, because the wind was building up and becoming decidedly chilly.
Soon after arriving here Wifey took a walk up to the main road to find the bust stop. We were so impressed with Nuneaton that we thought we might pay it another visit tomorrow. Fortunately the buses run about every half hour, so we’ll be able to go tomorrow morning.
Lunchtime was spent in The Corner House, where we enjoyed fish and chips; mine with mushy peas and Sheila’s with garden peas. For some odd reason she doesn’t particularly like the mushy ones, despite the fact that they were just made for fish and chips.
Now, although we took advantage of their ‘two for one’ offer; where you buy two meals and only pay for one of them; I’m pleased to say that the meals were not too big. So many pubs pile the plates up these days and, as I have mentioned before, neither of us has the capacity for big meals any more. This is probably because we have tended towards snacks on this trip, rather than full blown meals, such as Sunday roasts and big fry-ups, and our stomachs have shrunk. Even though the meal was of medium size, I still struggled with my second pint and have come to the conclusion that if I am to enjoy my two or three pints in future, I must refrain from food until I have put away at least one of them.
Friday 23rd September.
Well, after the gut-bashing yesterday; not just the fish and chips but the ‘eyes too big for the belly’ cheese sarni in the evening; my tummy is not happy this morning. Yesterday evening, after scoffing the aforementioned sarni, and already having taken a reading for blood glucose, which was quite high, unsurprisingly, I upped the insulin slightly and for my sins I suffered one of those rare hypos. This called for somewhat drastic action, which took the form of three Jelly Babies and a couple of Glucose Tablets.
What I hadn’t given much consideration to, was the fact that the bread used in the sarni was brown and, therefore, slow release as far as carbs go, so I really didn’t need to step up the insulin. We live and learn but, if we don’t learn, we die, which we all do eventually. Charming thought, eh?
Today. What to do! We are a little low on coal but, as the weather is still fairly mild, we can allow the fire to die down a little. This means we could still take the bus into Nuneaton as planned this morning and go on to the boatyard at Wood Bridge, which is the other side of Nuneaton on the Coventry Canal, tomorrow. We could even go on this afternoon if the weather is kind to us. The decision lies in the lap of the gods, or Wifey, whichever comes first.
We are now about three weeks away from Mercia and winter moorings and, since yesterday was the first day of winter, we will have spent three weeks cruising in icy, cold weather, wouldn’t we?
Oh, I forgot to mention, on our way here yesterday we passed our friends Dave and Jackie who were once moored at Pillings Lock. Lucky old them, they finally found moorings on the Ashby Canal, the area from which they originate, Good for them I say.
Saturday 24th September.
Hopefully we’ll be off to Wood Bridge Boatyard, which is about five miles away on the Coventry Canal. There are very good moorings there and we’ll be able to dispose of rubbish and such.
Monday 26th September.
Having spent Saturday night at Wood Bridge, we tootled along to the top of Atherstone locks on Sunday morning. Our original plan was to go down the first five locks, which would have brought us to the same stretch of moorings we had used in the past. However, after checking the First Mate book, we realised that the doctor’s surgery would be nearer from up top, and here we are.
We’ve heard reports from other boaters along the cut that, due to the persistently dry weather during the summer months, BW have applied restrictions to some locks around the system, with the Atherstone flight being one of them. Sheila was fortunate enough to find a BW man locking up the lock gates when she took Rusty out at 4 pm yesterday, and he confirmed closure of these locks between 08.30 and 16.00.
The problem with reduced water levels has been ongoing almost since we left Mercia in April, with some boaters having problems with grounding on some stretches of canals. Even the rivers Avon and Severn were noticeably low when we passed through them.
So, once we have seen the doctor for our prescriptions, and once we have picked up a few victuals from the local Co-op, we will probably take in all 11 locks in the flight and avoid any further hold-ups. This would take us about 4½ miles, to Polesworth. After that we’ll have another five miles and two locks to the end of the Coventry Canal and Fazely Junction.
Turning south onto the Birmingham and Fazely Canal would take us to Drayton Manor Theme Park and the lakes, which is where a couple of boaters Sheila spoke to yesterday, were heading. Alternatively, heading north-west on the same canal; although it has always been subsumed as the Coventry; would see us through to Fradley Junction and the Trent and Mersey.
The theme park is only about three miles out of our way and would take care of another couple of days and besides, we haven’t navigated that stretch of canal yet, so it would be new territory for us. Why not?
Tuesday 27th September.
After four weeks without having to pass through any locks, yesterday was lots of fun, but first we had to take a walk into Atherstone. Our initial intention was to pay a visit to the local surgery for a prescription but, with Atherstone being quite a big town, and remembering our experiences in Coventry, we opted for a visit to the Co-op only, after which we would set sail for some of those 11 locks.
This was not a sensible choice as it turned out, mainly because we had now given some of those late starters the opportunity to get ahead of us and, just as we were about to untie the boat, along came one heading for the first lock. After that it was really slow progress, even more so when we discovered that another boat was ahead of the first one, if you get my meaning.
Sheila would have gone through all 11 locks, what with it being such a beautiful, sunny day, but I wanted to moor up after the ninth one, which still left only about three miles to do in the morning, taking us to Polesworth. We could then enjoy the silence of open fields and the warmth of a late return of summer. That trip would have taken us a little over two hours had we been on our own, instead it took over three.
Now, if I’m remembering correctly, Internet access is not very strong at Polesworth. Having been reminded of the moorings by my good wife, we will be pretty low down compared to the rest of the village, so I’d best post this blog now. So saying, he plugs in his trusty dongle and waits for it to fire up. Although we are miles from any town here, the connection is very strong so, without more ado, here goes.
Cheers to all and have a good week.
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
About 3½ miles away from Market Bosworth, on the way back to the Coventry Canal, is Sutton Wharf, which has 48 hour moorings, a café and an Elsan disposal unit. The weather just now, at almost 7 am, is calm and sunny. Well, it will be when the sun comes up, so that is where we will head for after breakfast.
About 2½ miles further on is Stoke Golding, a small village that boasts three pubs. So, if we are unable to moor up at the café, we’ll move on to S.G. and enjoy our usual Sunday drink there.
Alternatively of course, we could simply stay here for another day and move on tomorrow, when there is much more likelihood of us finding moorings at Stoke Golding. Who knows? Baffled? Me too!
Saturday, apart from Wifey taking a walk into town and me having my monthly strip wash, nothing exciting occurred. However, we were set upon by some really heavy rain and hail stones later in the afternoon. Hopefully that’s all over now and we’ll be able to enjoy a much warmer day.
Monday 19th September
Yesterday we actually cruised through to Stoke Golding after stopping at off at Sutton Wharf, where we would have stayed overnight had there been any space. As it turned out though, the cruise to Stoke Golding was the right choice, since there was more than enough space to accommodate us.
On our last visit here 4 years ago the White Swan wasn’t open at lunchtime but, with it being a Sunday this time around, it was and so we spent a very pleasant hour there. Looking across at the table next to ours we were surprised to see the size of the meals they were enjoying. The price for their two-course Sunday lunch was just £5.95. Sadly I am currently unable to devour such a meal these days, more’s the pity. Indeed, we rarely eat more than a snack on Sundays now, simply because we don’t have the capacity for full blown roasts any more.
We took the bus into Nuneaton this morning and were surprised at the range of shops there. Unlike many other towns of similar size, not all of the supermarkets were out of town, the Asda store here is pretty big and we will try to pay it a visit within the next few days. Hopefully we’ll be moored at Lime Kilns soon and should be able to catch a bus into town again from there.
Tuesday 20th September
Judging by the weather we won’t be going very far. Although it isn’t raining yet, there is a pretty strong wind, which is not conducive to pleasant cruising. It may be just a case of Wifey trotting off for the paper and cruising to the next available mooring spot. We will see and you will be informed of our progress, or lack of.
Wednesday 21st September.
Yesterday, having spent two days at Stoke Golding, and despite the strong wind and threat of rain, we decided to make our way towards Lime Kilns. Sadly the threatened rain did more than threaten, so we pulled in and moored up at bridge 23, about a mile away and a total of 30 minutes cruising. With no prospect of the day brightening up, we decided to stay put for the day.
This morning is calm with a thick cloud cover, but there are signs that the clouds are now breaking up, so we should be on our way later.
Thursday 22nd September.
We took ourselves for a stroll to the nearest garage for the paper this morning but, sadly, no bus stops in sight, so no trip into Nuneaton today. Instead we’ll top up with water and make our way to Bulkington and the Corner House pub, which we called into on our way through. At the time we weren’t really up for a pub lunch, but this time we’ll give them a try. The moorings there are pretty sparse, with room for only three boats and it’s really a case of timing the arrival at such places. Get there too early, say, between 9 and 10 am, and those lazy holidaymakers will probably still be eating breakfast, any time after 10 and we might just be lucky.
17.00 same day.
We finally made it to Bulkington at about 10.45 this morning and found, much to our surprise and delight, that there was plenty of room to moor up. Just as well really, because the wind was building up and becoming decidedly chilly.
Soon after arriving here Wifey took a walk up to the main road to find the bust stop. We were so impressed with Nuneaton that we thought we might pay it another visit tomorrow. Fortunately the buses run about every half hour, so we’ll be able to go tomorrow morning.
Lunchtime was spent in The Corner House, where we enjoyed fish and chips; mine with mushy peas and Sheila’s with garden peas. For some odd reason she doesn’t particularly like the mushy ones, despite the fact that they were just made for fish and chips.
Now, although we took advantage of their ‘two for one’ offer; where you buy two meals and only pay for one of them; I’m pleased to say that the meals were not too big. So many pubs pile the plates up these days and, as I have mentioned before, neither of us has the capacity for big meals any more. This is probably because we have tended towards snacks on this trip, rather than full blown meals, such as Sunday roasts and big fry-ups, and our stomachs have shrunk. Even though the meal was of medium size, I still struggled with my second pint and have come to the conclusion that if I am to enjoy my two or three pints in future, I must refrain from food until I have put away at least one of them.
Friday 23rd September.
Well, after the gut-bashing yesterday; not just the fish and chips but the ‘eyes too big for the belly’ cheese sarni in the evening; my tummy is not happy this morning. Yesterday evening, after scoffing the aforementioned sarni, and already having taken a reading for blood glucose, which was quite high, unsurprisingly, I upped the insulin slightly and for my sins I suffered one of those rare hypos. This called for somewhat drastic action, which took the form of three Jelly Babies and a couple of Glucose Tablets.
What I hadn’t given much consideration to, was the fact that the bread used in the sarni was brown and, therefore, slow release as far as carbs go, so I really didn’t need to step up the insulin. We live and learn but, if we don’t learn, we die, which we all do eventually. Charming thought, eh?
Today. What to do! We are a little low on coal but, as the weather is still fairly mild, we can allow the fire to die down a little. This means we could still take the bus into Nuneaton as planned this morning and go on to the boatyard at Wood Bridge, which is the other side of Nuneaton on the Coventry Canal, tomorrow. We could even go on this afternoon if the weather is kind to us. The decision lies in the lap of the gods, or Wifey, whichever comes first.
We are now about three weeks away from Mercia and winter moorings and, since yesterday was the first day of winter, we will have spent three weeks cruising in icy, cold weather, wouldn’t we?
Oh, I forgot to mention, on our way here yesterday we passed our friends Dave and Jackie who were once moored at Pillings Lock. Lucky old them, they finally found moorings on the Ashby Canal, the area from which they originate, Good for them I say.
Saturday 24th September.
Hopefully we’ll be off to Wood Bridge Boatyard, which is about five miles away on the Coventry Canal. There are very good moorings there and we’ll be able to dispose of rubbish and such.
Monday 26th September.
Having spent Saturday night at Wood Bridge, we tootled along to the top of Atherstone locks on Sunday morning. Our original plan was to go down the first five locks, which would have brought us to the same stretch of moorings we had used in the past. However, after checking the First Mate book, we realised that the doctor’s surgery would be nearer from up top, and here we are.
We’ve heard reports from other boaters along the cut that, due to the persistently dry weather during the summer months, BW have applied restrictions to some locks around the system, with the Atherstone flight being one of them. Sheila was fortunate enough to find a BW man locking up the lock gates when she took Rusty out at 4 pm yesterday, and he confirmed closure of these locks between 08.30 and 16.00.
The problem with reduced water levels has been ongoing almost since we left Mercia in April, with some boaters having problems with grounding on some stretches of canals. Even the rivers Avon and Severn were noticeably low when we passed through them.
So, once we have seen the doctor for our prescriptions, and once we have picked up a few victuals from the local Co-op, we will probably take in all 11 locks in the flight and avoid any further hold-ups. This would take us about 4½ miles, to Polesworth. After that we’ll have another five miles and two locks to the end of the Coventry Canal and Fazely Junction.
Turning south onto the Birmingham and Fazely Canal would take us to Drayton Manor Theme Park and the lakes, which is where a couple of boaters Sheila spoke to yesterday, were heading. Alternatively, heading north-west on the same canal; although it has always been subsumed as the Coventry; would see us through to Fradley Junction and the Trent and Mersey.
The theme park is only about three miles out of our way and would take care of another couple of days and besides, we haven’t navigated that stretch of canal yet, so it would be new territory for us. Why not?
Tuesday 27th September.
After four weeks without having to pass through any locks, yesterday was lots of fun, but first we had to take a walk into Atherstone. Our initial intention was to pay a visit to the local surgery for a prescription but, with Atherstone being quite a big town, and remembering our experiences in Coventry, we opted for a visit to the Co-op only, after which we would set sail for some of those 11 locks.
This was not a sensible choice as it turned out, mainly because we had now given some of those late starters the opportunity to get ahead of us and, just as we were about to untie the boat, along came one heading for the first lock. After that it was really slow progress, even more so when we discovered that another boat was ahead of the first one, if you get my meaning.
Sheila would have gone through all 11 locks, what with it being such a beautiful, sunny day, but I wanted to moor up after the ninth one, which still left only about three miles to do in the morning, taking us to Polesworth. We could then enjoy the silence of open fields and the warmth of a late return of summer. That trip would have taken us a little over two hours had we been on our own, instead it took over three.
Now, if I’m remembering correctly, Internet access is not very strong at Polesworth. Having been reminded of the moorings by my good wife, we will be pretty low down compared to the rest of the village, so I’d best post this blog now. So saying, he plugs in his trusty dongle and waits for it to fire up. Although we are miles from any town here, the connection is very strong so, without more ado, here goes.
Cheers to all and have a good week.
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
Friday, 16 September 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #28
Sunday 11th September.
I’m sure that, like us on Shiralee, you will have given some thought to all those who suffered, and are still suffering, from the devastation cause by 9/11.
Yesterday was quite ordinary in terms of cruising, with just 5½ miles to go to Market Bosworth and no locks. The trip took about two hours and, since the Ashby must me just about the dirtiest canal on the system, we picked up a load of rubbish on the bow, which Wifey finally removed with the boat hook.
Sadly the town is quite a distance away from our moorings and, with the buses only running every hour – typical! – we decided it would be more expedient for Sheila to walk in for groceries.
Today, if the weather continues as it is, with blue skies and a following wind, we’ll probably move on to the Leicestershire village of Congerstone, which is only two miles away and boasts a pub called The Horse and Jockey that is only a short walk from the canal. If we don’t move on today, and if the forecasters are correct in their predictions of severe storms, we won’t be moving on tomorrow either, which means I’ll miss my Sunday drink, and that would be a devastating state of affairs.
10.45 am from Congerstone and, as expected, the local pub is no longer trading. However, since I’m not busting for a drink and moorings are pretty scarce at Shackerstone, we’re staying here for today and, if the expected storm hits tomorrow, we’ll still be here and move on on Tuesday.
Monday 12th September.
The wind is winding and I have to get the dog out before the rain starts raining.
O.K. That’s that little job jobbed, poochy is watered and pooped.
Yesterday, despite what we feared, stayed dry but windy. Today however, having seen the Countryfile programme last night, should be mostly dry. It seems that the heavy rain and storms previously predicted for this part of the UK, will now be felt, in all their glory, much further north. So, you nice folks who have just returned from a very pleasant cruise, will now have to batten down the hatches.
The moorings at Congerstone are so quiet and isolated, and we really have no immediate need to move on, so we’ll probably stay another day and go on to Shackerstone or Snarestone tomorrow. Snarestone is the end of the navigable stretch of the Ashby Canal. There are plans to have it extended all the way to Ashby-de-la-Zouche, but I doubt it wall happen in my lifetime, it took 38 years to complete the restoration of the Droitwich canals, what chance the Ashby?
Tuesday 13th September.
The early mornings are getting cooler, which I especially notice when I am obliged to walk Rusty at 05.30, when it is still dark. Still, she only pesters that early if she’s really busting for a pee. After yesterdays high winds this morning is relatively calm, so we’ll be off to Shackerstone or Snarestone, depending upon which of them we can find moorings at. Shackerstone will probably be OK, since all the boats attending last weekends jaunt have now departed.
If we stop at Shackerstone we’ll probably give The Rising Sun a look in at lunchtime. If we have to go on to Snarestone it will be The Globe, but that will be after a bus trip into Measham, to which this will be our first visit. That assumes of course that buses actually run from anywhere near the moorings, you can never tell when out cruising.
My dear brother Alan recently informed me that our Alfa 147 is playing up. He’s having problems starting the thing because, in the first instance, the battery had gone flat from lack of use and, in the most recent instance, because the computer wouldn’t recognise the Key Code.
The reasons for these problems could be either of at least two things; a/ the Code has been lost from the key or, b/ the computer didn’t like the fact that he used jump-leads in order to try starting it. Either way it looks like more expense on our part. Yesterday Alan phoned to tell me he was going to try charging our battery up overnight and see if that does the trick. If that doesn’t work, he’ll take the key to have it checked out and re-coded. If those two don’t work it will mean a new battery for the car and the services of an expert in these matters.
I tell you, I only have to turn my back on a car and it will go wrong. These things rarely happen while I’m around. I simply do not have problems with cars, except the usual flat tyres and such. A few weeks after I sold the RAV4 the timing belt snapped, and you all know the problems we had with the Alfa before this one, and that was soon after getting it back after cruising. Still, looking on the positive side, Alan has several weeks yet to get the darned thing fixed.
Same Day 15.15.
We arrived at Snarestone at about 10.15 this morning, after a great deal of struggle against strong winds. It wasn’t that way when we left Congerstone, but developed after we had passed through Shackerstone. Anyway, after passing through the 250 yard tunnel, topping up with water and disposing of rubbish, we turned around and moored up.
We were hoping to visit The Globe for lunch but, as seems to be happening more and more these days, we found that the place only opens in the evenings. We then decided to take a bus into Measham, but Sheila was unable to discover exactly where the bus stop was.
Just opposite the water point is a cabin, which holds all kinds of info about the Ashby canal and what is being done to restore it. This is cared for by a gentleman who lives on his boat nearby. Upon asking him about bus times, he suggested we ask the pub landlord. We’re not making much progress here so far!!
Eventually I did what I should have done in the first place, I went online and found the phone number of the bus company who run services through here, and I gave them a call, which resulted in times for tomorrow morning. So, around 10.30 tomorrow morning we’ll take the bus into Measham and be back for about half past one. Sorted!
Wednesday 14th September and, at 06.30 the sky is clear and that wind has dropped. Hopefully it will stay that way for our trip into Measham.
I spoke to a couple yesterday who had walked along the towpath as far as Moira, which is about a mile or so the other side of Measham. It seems that the Ashby Canal Society are making good progress restoring that end of the canal, whilst this end has already been improved, with a slipway and concrete edges to the canal. Unfortunately these restoration projects rely on volunteers for the most part, so I don’t see it being completed any time soon. It really is a shame that government is so blinkered and can’t see the benefits to local communities of these derelict canals being opened. Environment ministers are always keen to appear in public, spouting rhetoric about how they are improving small businesses in small communities, but that’s all it is, rhetoric! No actual financial assistance is ever forthcoming.
Thursday 15th September.
Yesterday we took a trip into Measham by bus for some shopping. Having found almost all that we needed in Tesco, the local butcher and a card shop, we then had about 1 ½ hours to kill before catching the return bus, and it wasn’t even midday. So, we popped into a local coffee shop for coffee and tea cakes.
At about 11.10, whilst we were sitting there enjoying our snack, along came a bus that looked suspiciously like the one we came up on. After coffee we strolled along to the bus stop and discovered that we really didn’t have to wait for the 13.10 for our lift home, because there was another one due at 11.40, only 10 minutes away. However, having waited until 11.50 without said bus arriving, I telephoned the bus company, only to discover that the timetable attached to the bus stop was wrong and we did, indeed, have to wait until 13.10, over an hour away. It seems that the locals have been complaining about this for quite a while with the County Council, because it is they who should be installing the correct timetable.
Fortunately, just across the road from the stop there sits a Community Office, where Wifey gleaned the number of a local cabby and, at the cost of a fiver, we were home safely before 12.30, the walk from the drop off point being of longer duration than the cab ride. With hindsight we should have gone on to Ashby, only another 10 minutes or so longer, where we would have found much more to do to while awaiting the time until our return bus was due.
If our chats with other boaters is anything to go by, the vast majority of Brits can find very little of entertainment value on TV these days, and we count ourselves among them. Yesterday evening, after scanning the Sunday Supplement list of progs, we settled on the new Dinosaur thingy on BBC1, followed by Who Do You Think You Are?, with Alan ‘Chatty Man’ Carr.
Now, our wee doggy seldom watches telly, preferring instead to while away the time left before bedtime in sleeping. Just for a change, and just as the Dinosaur prog started, she jumped up onto Sheila’s chair, lay her head on her knee and stared at the screen, utterly enthralled by the actions of these big beasts. We haven’t seen her do that since the last time we watched one of those vet rescue shows, but that didn’t hold her attention quite like the dinosaurs did. Could this be racial memory, or weren’t canines around 80 million years ago?
And, how about Alan Carr’s great-great-grandfather, a deserter no less, with 12 children. Just how did he pull that one off without being discovered? Of course he changed his name, but it still should not have been difficult for the authorities to find him!
Today we’re off the Shackerstone and a pub lunch, and about time too since I missed out on Sunday, again!!
11.15 am at Shackerstone.
I forgot to mention earlier, that the problem with the Alfa was all down to the battery being low on charge. Once Alan charged it up for 24 hours all was tickety boo. So, panic over. I can now look forward to a relaxing pint or three at the Rising Sun this afternoon.
Saturday 17th September.
We set off from Shackerstone yesterday at 8 am and passed under bridge 52, which is when Sheila saw a lightning flash followed by a roll of thunder. Needless to say these were followed rather rapidly by a sudden shower, which obliged us to pull in and shelter. The rain stopped almost as soon as it started, so we continued on our way to Market Bosworth, where we arrived at about 9.15.
I was well aware that the walk into town was mostly uphill but, what the heck, this also meant it was mostly downhill on the way back. So, after fortifying ourselves with a cuppa, we set off on our uphill trek. A couple of hundred yards or so up the steepest part of the hill is a bus stop, where Sheila suggested we might wait for a bus, seeing as how it was now 09.35 and the bus was due at 09.40. Well, we waited until 09.50 and, with no sign of the bus, started walking again. My reaction to the darned thing passing us a few minutes later is not printable.
I have, as I have mentioned in previous blogs – I think! – a pretty lousy memory, especially what certain towns look like, and Market Bosworth is no exception. However, once the walk came back to me, so did much of what the town looks like. As small towns go MB has everything it needs by way of shops, including butcher, baker and greengrocer, not to mention several pubs. It was not until we had completed our shopping and were on the way back, that we realised that the pub we had used on our previous visit, was now being turned into a block of flats. Another one has fallen into the hands of developers.
It’s true to say that I do need the exercise, but I’m afraid Wifey will be doing the walking this morning and, despite it being Sunday tomorrow, I will do without my Sunday pint, unless we decide to move on to Stoke Golding, that is.
Meanwhile, with eight pages already under my belt, I’ll wish you all a pleasant weekend and leave you with this thought, I need a new battery for the car because, having tried starting it yesterday and been faced with another refusal by the recalcitrant lump of metal, Alan will be fitting a new one soon. More expense!!
Cheers everybody.
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
I’m sure that, like us on Shiralee, you will have given some thought to all those who suffered, and are still suffering, from the devastation cause by 9/11.
Yesterday was quite ordinary in terms of cruising, with just 5½ miles to go to Market Bosworth and no locks. The trip took about two hours and, since the Ashby must me just about the dirtiest canal on the system, we picked up a load of rubbish on the bow, which Wifey finally removed with the boat hook.
Sadly the town is quite a distance away from our moorings and, with the buses only running every hour – typical! – we decided it would be more expedient for Sheila to walk in for groceries.
Today, if the weather continues as it is, with blue skies and a following wind, we’ll probably move on to the Leicestershire village of Congerstone, which is only two miles away and boasts a pub called The Horse and Jockey that is only a short walk from the canal. If we don’t move on today, and if the forecasters are correct in their predictions of severe storms, we won’t be moving on tomorrow either, which means I’ll miss my Sunday drink, and that would be a devastating state of affairs.
10.45 am from Congerstone and, as expected, the local pub is no longer trading. However, since I’m not busting for a drink and moorings are pretty scarce at Shackerstone, we’re staying here for today and, if the expected storm hits tomorrow, we’ll still be here and move on on Tuesday.
Monday 12th September.
The wind is winding and I have to get the dog out before the rain starts raining.
O.K. That’s that little job jobbed, poochy is watered and pooped.
Yesterday, despite what we feared, stayed dry but windy. Today however, having seen the Countryfile programme last night, should be mostly dry. It seems that the heavy rain and storms previously predicted for this part of the UK, will now be felt, in all their glory, much further north. So, you nice folks who have just returned from a very pleasant cruise, will now have to batten down the hatches.
The moorings at Congerstone are so quiet and isolated, and we really have no immediate need to move on, so we’ll probably stay another day and go on to Shackerstone or Snarestone tomorrow. Snarestone is the end of the navigable stretch of the Ashby Canal. There are plans to have it extended all the way to Ashby-de-la-Zouche, but I doubt it wall happen in my lifetime, it took 38 years to complete the restoration of the Droitwich canals, what chance the Ashby?
Tuesday 13th September.
The early mornings are getting cooler, which I especially notice when I am obliged to walk Rusty at 05.30, when it is still dark. Still, she only pesters that early if she’s really busting for a pee. After yesterdays high winds this morning is relatively calm, so we’ll be off to Shackerstone or Snarestone, depending upon which of them we can find moorings at. Shackerstone will probably be OK, since all the boats attending last weekends jaunt have now departed.
If we stop at Shackerstone we’ll probably give The Rising Sun a look in at lunchtime. If we have to go on to Snarestone it will be The Globe, but that will be after a bus trip into Measham, to which this will be our first visit. That assumes of course that buses actually run from anywhere near the moorings, you can never tell when out cruising.
My dear brother Alan recently informed me that our Alfa 147 is playing up. He’s having problems starting the thing because, in the first instance, the battery had gone flat from lack of use and, in the most recent instance, because the computer wouldn’t recognise the Key Code.
The reasons for these problems could be either of at least two things; a/ the Code has been lost from the key or, b/ the computer didn’t like the fact that he used jump-leads in order to try starting it. Either way it looks like more expense on our part. Yesterday Alan phoned to tell me he was going to try charging our battery up overnight and see if that does the trick. If that doesn’t work, he’ll take the key to have it checked out and re-coded. If those two don’t work it will mean a new battery for the car and the services of an expert in these matters.
I tell you, I only have to turn my back on a car and it will go wrong. These things rarely happen while I’m around. I simply do not have problems with cars, except the usual flat tyres and such. A few weeks after I sold the RAV4 the timing belt snapped, and you all know the problems we had with the Alfa before this one, and that was soon after getting it back after cruising. Still, looking on the positive side, Alan has several weeks yet to get the darned thing fixed.
Same Day 15.15.
We arrived at Snarestone at about 10.15 this morning, after a great deal of struggle against strong winds. It wasn’t that way when we left Congerstone, but developed after we had passed through Shackerstone. Anyway, after passing through the 250 yard tunnel, topping up with water and disposing of rubbish, we turned around and moored up.
We were hoping to visit The Globe for lunch but, as seems to be happening more and more these days, we found that the place only opens in the evenings. We then decided to take a bus into Measham, but Sheila was unable to discover exactly where the bus stop was.
Just opposite the water point is a cabin, which holds all kinds of info about the Ashby canal and what is being done to restore it. This is cared for by a gentleman who lives on his boat nearby. Upon asking him about bus times, he suggested we ask the pub landlord. We’re not making much progress here so far!!
Eventually I did what I should have done in the first place, I went online and found the phone number of the bus company who run services through here, and I gave them a call, which resulted in times for tomorrow morning. So, around 10.30 tomorrow morning we’ll take the bus into Measham and be back for about half past one. Sorted!
Wednesday 14th September and, at 06.30 the sky is clear and that wind has dropped. Hopefully it will stay that way for our trip into Measham.
I spoke to a couple yesterday who had walked along the towpath as far as Moira, which is about a mile or so the other side of Measham. It seems that the Ashby Canal Society are making good progress restoring that end of the canal, whilst this end has already been improved, with a slipway and concrete edges to the canal. Unfortunately these restoration projects rely on volunteers for the most part, so I don’t see it being completed any time soon. It really is a shame that government is so blinkered and can’t see the benefits to local communities of these derelict canals being opened. Environment ministers are always keen to appear in public, spouting rhetoric about how they are improving small businesses in small communities, but that’s all it is, rhetoric! No actual financial assistance is ever forthcoming.
Thursday 15th September.
Yesterday we took a trip into Measham by bus for some shopping. Having found almost all that we needed in Tesco, the local butcher and a card shop, we then had about 1 ½ hours to kill before catching the return bus, and it wasn’t even midday. So, we popped into a local coffee shop for coffee and tea cakes.
At about 11.10, whilst we were sitting there enjoying our snack, along came a bus that looked suspiciously like the one we came up on. After coffee we strolled along to the bus stop and discovered that we really didn’t have to wait for the 13.10 for our lift home, because there was another one due at 11.40, only 10 minutes away. However, having waited until 11.50 without said bus arriving, I telephoned the bus company, only to discover that the timetable attached to the bus stop was wrong and we did, indeed, have to wait until 13.10, over an hour away. It seems that the locals have been complaining about this for quite a while with the County Council, because it is they who should be installing the correct timetable.
Fortunately, just across the road from the stop there sits a Community Office, where Wifey gleaned the number of a local cabby and, at the cost of a fiver, we were home safely before 12.30, the walk from the drop off point being of longer duration than the cab ride. With hindsight we should have gone on to Ashby, only another 10 minutes or so longer, where we would have found much more to do to while awaiting the time until our return bus was due.
If our chats with other boaters is anything to go by, the vast majority of Brits can find very little of entertainment value on TV these days, and we count ourselves among them. Yesterday evening, after scanning the Sunday Supplement list of progs, we settled on the new Dinosaur thingy on BBC1, followed by Who Do You Think You Are?, with Alan ‘Chatty Man’ Carr.
Now, our wee doggy seldom watches telly, preferring instead to while away the time left before bedtime in sleeping. Just for a change, and just as the Dinosaur prog started, she jumped up onto Sheila’s chair, lay her head on her knee and stared at the screen, utterly enthralled by the actions of these big beasts. We haven’t seen her do that since the last time we watched one of those vet rescue shows, but that didn’t hold her attention quite like the dinosaurs did. Could this be racial memory, or weren’t canines around 80 million years ago?
And, how about Alan Carr’s great-great-grandfather, a deserter no less, with 12 children. Just how did he pull that one off without being discovered? Of course he changed his name, but it still should not have been difficult for the authorities to find him!
Today we’re off the Shackerstone and a pub lunch, and about time too since I missed out on Sunday, again!!
11.15 am at Shackerstone.
I forgot to mention earlier, that the problem with the Alfa was all down to the battery being low on charge. Once Alan charged it up for 24 hours all was tickety boo. So, panic over. I can now look forward to a relaxing pint or three at the Rising Sun this afternoon.
Saturday 17th September.
We set off from Shackerstone yesterday at 8 am and passed under bridge 52, which is when Sheila saw a lightning flash followed by a roll of thunder. Needless to say these were followed rather rapidly by a sudden shower, which obliged us to pull in and shelter. The rain stopped almost as soon as it started, so we continued on our way to Market Bosworth, where we arrived at about 9.15.
I was well aware that the walk into town was mostly uphill but, what the heck, this also meant it was mostly downhill on the way back. So, after fortifying ourselves with a cuppa, we set off on our uphill trek. A couple of hundred yards or so up the steepest part of the hill is a bus stop, where Sheila suggested we might wait for a bus, seeing as how it was now 09.35 and the bus was due at 09.40. Well, we waited until 09.50 and, with no sign of the bus, started walking again. My reaction to the darned thing passing us a few minutes later is not printable.
I have, as I have mentioned in previous blogs – I think! – a pretty lousy memory, especially what certain towns look like, and Market Bosworth is no exception. However, once the walk came back to me, so did much of what the town looks like. As small towns go MB has everything it needs by way of shops, including butcher, baker and greengrocer, not to mention several pubs. It was not until we had completed our shopping and were on the way back, that we realised that the pub we had used on our previous visit, was now being turned into a block of flats. Another one has fallen into the hands of developers.
It’s true to say that I do need the exercise, but I’m afraid Wifey will be doing the walking this morning and, despite it being Sunday tomorrow, I will do without my Sunday pint, unless we decide to move on to Stoke Golding, that is.
Meanwhile, with eight pages already under my belt, I’ll wish you all a pleasant weekend and leave you with this thought, I need a new battery for the car because, having tried starting it yesterday and been faced with another refusal by the recalcitrant lump of metal, Alan will be fitting a new one soon. More expense!!
Cheers everybody.
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
Friday, 9 September 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #27
Friday 2nd September 3 pm.
This morning we took a walk in across the bridge to the local shop for the paper and a bottle of milk. Sadly, although the papers were in, the milk wasn’t, so Wifey took another walk later. Where we intend mooring up tomorrow, which is in the middle of nowhere in particular, it’s unlikely we’ll find a shop.
At lunchtime we spent a very pleasant hour or so sitting outside The Greyhound pub with drinks and snacks. The pub is situated at a spot called Sutton Stop, right at the junction of the Coventry and North Oxford canals. The place is named after the man who took the tolls at the stop-lock many years ago, whose name, unsurprisingly, was Sutton.
Looking towards the front of the pub from the Coventry canal towpath, you would see mooring bollards directly outside the pub, which are for the likes of daily trip boats. To the left of the pub is the aforementioned stop-lock, which is at the top of the North Oxford canal.
This lock opens into the small basin in front of the pub and, in order to access the Coventry canal, boaters pass under a bridge, turning left for Coventry and right for moorings and onward to the other end of the Coventry at Fradley Junction and the Trent and Mersey Canal, which is where we will be heading once we have taken a two c week run up the Ashby canal and back.
Our next mooring stop will be between Bedworth and Hinkley, but in a quiet area without much by way of habitation, except a pub called the Corner House Hotel at Bulkington, after two days of which we’ll be spending three nights at Trinity Marina on the Ashby Canal. After our disappointment with the Barby Marina we really do need a couple of days on a landline to charge our batteries. Happily the gentleman at Barby has forwarded the disc that Alan sent there for us to collect.
Saturday 3rd September.
We took our time leaving Hawkesbury Junction this morning, partly because Wifey wanted to walk to the shop for the paper, and partly because she also wanted to get some washing done. The fact that I also wanted to catch up on some much needed shuteye was also part of the equation.
We eventually set off at about 9.30 and, after just three miles, arrived at bridge 5 on the Ashby Canal. This bridge leads into the village of Bulkington and is one of those places we stopped at on our first cruise in 2007. In fact, looking back on Sheila’s diary for that year, we spent 12 days on this canal, much of the time passed away in pubs. Since we plan on being here for about two weeks this time, we could well surpass our record of seven pubs in total, with The George and Dragon at Stoke Golding being honoured with our presence twice. Although, as we’ve already covered The George and Dragon, we may well walk through to the village of Dadlington and The Dog and Hedgehog.
The first on this pub crawl will be at the Corner House Hotel right here in Bulkington tomorrow lunch time. On Monday we will be in Trinity Marina, where we plan on staying for three nights to charge our batteries on a landline. Believe it or not the marina has a pub, so we’ll be well on our way towards beating the previous record, and we’ll be only six miles into the 22 mile canal. No problem there then! Naturally I’ll keep you posted on our progress.
Sunday 4th September
Nasty, drizzly rain this morning and our wee pooch is unwell again. When her tummy is upset, she tends to hang her head and look really sorry for herself. Happily she soon gets over it and, by the time we got back from the Corner House here in Bulkington she was almost back to normal.
The Corner House is, as is usual in this part of the world, a big pub with a good sized car park. Unusually the place started filling up pretty early, no doubt because the meals are very reasonably priced, as are the drinks. Guinness is only £3.15p per pint, a nice change from some of the pubs we’ve been in recently. Unfortunately the cold pump wasn’t working and, as I suspected, since both pumps usually run off the same barrel, the normal temperature pump also gave up the ghost and I had to settle for a Guinness and Mild for the second one.
Actually that’s how I was first introduced to Guinness many years ago, by my ex-wife’s grandfather who lived in Surrey and made his own mild. In those days Guinness came in bottles, there was no such thing as draught. Like most young people at the time, I turned my nose up at the mere idea of allowing that mucky stuff into my mouth, much less my stomach. However, granddad insisted that I give it a try, but mixed with more mild than Guinness. Eventually, after many such visits, I was drinking 100% Guinness and haven’t looked back. So, that second pint, that had mild added, was a memory jogger.
Thus far, over the five months we have been cruising, we have spent a pleasant hour or so in 38 pubs. This equates to one visit every four days. Hopefully we’ll improve on that during the time remaining to us and get it up to two per week, or even better. We’ll certainly have ample opportunity along the Ashby.
Tomorrow morning we’ll be off to Trinity Marina which, if the price is right, might be a good alternative for winter 2012/13, since it will be about the same distance from Harlow as Barby which, as you all know, is not finished yet and didn’t look likely to be any time soon. We shall see!
Monday 5th September and I am sitting here, at 05.45, freezing cold in this tin tomb. Why? Because, as I have said in the past, our nice, new batteries are not fit for purpose. I have been running our engine for at least four hours every day, sometimes five hours and, on most mornings I am at least able to run the heater. This morning, with the batteries reading only 11.7 volts, the heater refused to start up.
Yesterday evening we watched just 2½ hours of television, that’s all, and our batteries have slumped to next to nothing. I won’t even be able to switch the Inverter/Charger on to plug the laptop in, because that would deplete them even more. In fact, when I do turn on the I/C it isn’t long before the lights begin to flicker, which is a sure sign that the I/C is going off and on and I have to turn it off.
With other boats moored nearby I can’t run the engine until 08.00, so we are unable to do anything electrical until then. It seems we are going to have to return to having six batteries instead of the current four. It’s just as well we’re spending three days and night at Trinity Marina from today, otherwise I doubt we would get back to Mercia without some serious problems. If I don’t see a marked improvement after that time we’ll be going back sooner than we would like. I am now wasting gas by having the cooker on to keep warm.
Well, that’s it for this entry, I’m too annoyed to write anything sensible for now. It’s just as well I charged the laptop yesterday while engine was running, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to treat you all to a moan.
It is now 06.45 and I have just come back from walking the dog. The batteries are now reading just 10.5 volts. Wifey will be lucky if she can run the taps in the bathroom at this rate, and I am sitting here in a darkened boat because I daren’t turn any lights on. Nope, these batteries are not fit for purpose, at least, four of them aren’t. It seems we will definitely have to increase to six before we leave Mercia next year. At least then we should have enough overnight charge to run the heater.
Tuesday 6th September and I’m pleased to say I’m in a much better mood today.
We decided to leave Bulkington a little later than usual yesterday, to allow the big, working boats that had attended the festival at Shackerstone over the weekend, to pass us on their way out of the Ashby Canal. Leaving at 9 am, as we did, we hoped to reduce the amount of these bigger boats, at least by a few.
We were headed for Trinity Marina, which is just past bridge 17 and, even though we did come across a few returning boats, we didn’t experience any real problems with them. Trouble can arise when faced with one of these older, working boats, especially when they are towing a ‘butty’. This engineless boat can be as long as the one towing it and, if they are both 70 feet long and you meet on a bend, great care must be taken. The towing boat is unable to slow down and the man in control has to rely on the skill of the boater approaching. Almost all of these boats are of timber construction, so a collision with a steel hulled boat could cause serious damage.
After a five mile trip we arrived at Trinity at about 11.00, just in time to miss the rain and higher winds, which really rocked us later in the evening and during the night. Happily it had stopped raining by the time I took Rusty out a short while ago.
We are staying at the marina until Thursday morning, giving us 72 hours on the mains electrickery, which should be plenty of time to charge the batteries and, hopefully, see us back to Mercia without further problems. If not then, well, you know the rest. It really is great to be able to run the television and lights, along with the heating, without having to worry about being able to turn the heating on in the morning and charging the laptop.
When we arrived here we collected an info sheet regarding mooring fees because we are considering coming here for winter 2012. Alas, whilst their fees are similar to those of Mercia, they also demand a huge bonding fee on top of everything else being paid. On the example we found on the reverse of the info sheet this bond amounted to over £400. What we are asking ourselves is, why? It’s not as if we would be hiring a cottage or caravan with a whole bunch of stuff entrusted to our care. We are simply mooring up for the winter, what can we possibly do that requires a financial bond?
Nope, don’t think we’ll be coming here, this extra fee strikes me as a simple money maker, levied on unfortunate boaters to give the owners of the site a bit of positive cash flow. Needless to say, I won’t be posting this blog until we have left, just in case someone does a Paul from Pillings Lock and takes umbrage at reading it.
Today we’ll be taking the bus into Hinkley for shopping.
Cheers for now. More tomorrow.
Wednesday 7th September and, I’m pleased to say, that the wind has dropped and the rain has stopped. It’s now 07.00 and I’ve just returned from walking Rusty, who seems to be unwell again. She’ll be hanging her head again for a few hours and will refuse her food.
Yesterday we took a bus ride into Hinkley and the rain finally hit us, just as we were walking up the high street. Happily it didn’t last long and we managed the return trip without a soaking. The shopping area is quite spread and doesn’t have a supermarket anywhere that we could see. However, when the bus we came in on pulled away, his destination blind said ’Morrisson’s’, so even Hinkley is not free of the giants.
Today we’ll enjoy another pub lunch at the nearby Brewer’s Fayre.
Thursday 8th September.
Well, it’s still a bit blustery out there and we have to leave Trinity today, probably for Stoke Golding, which is about three miles away. But, if the weather turns really nasty, we’ll stop along the cut just as soon as we can.
We enjoyed a pub lunch at The Marina, the Brewer’s Fayre pub next to the marina and also next to a Premier Inn. It was one of their establishments that helped us out many years ago, when we drove into a severe blizzard crossing the Pennines. After seeing the lights glimmering through the snow storm, we pulled in and booked in for one night. By morning however, the snow was so deep as to be impossible to drive, and also impossible for snow ploughs to reach us. The management of the place kindly put us up and fed and watered us for a second night, absolutely free of charge. So, it’s always a pleasure to pay one of their outlets a visit when we can.
We’ll probably leave a bit later than normal, say about 10 am or so. This will give us time to dispose of rubbish, top up with water and get today’s Mail.
Friday 9th September.
We left Trinity at about 09.30 yesterday, after spending some time talking to a couple of other boaters, who agreed that this particular marina is not the friendliest of moorings. The financial bond was new to them, as was the £50 deposit for the access key to the steel gates.
At Mercia and Pillings Lock marinas we were struck by how friendly the other boaters were, nobody would dream of walking past you without a cheery ‘hello’. What a difference at Trinity, where quite a few people ignore you completely. What a shame too, because it casts a sad reflection on management of the place. After all, if your customers are happy it shows in their attitude towards others. It’s very much like being back in Harlow, where you only have to stray a few hundred yards from home, and you’ll be looked upon as a complete stranger. Sad!
Another boater, we heard, had already left for Barby Marina, what was he thinking? He’ll probably find himself waiting a couple of months for his pontoon to be built, much like the other half dozen boats we saw clustered together. The advert for that place has been running for at least a couple of months, with pretty artist’s impressions of what it will look like. Any port in a storm, or so they say, but it’s doubtful we’ll even consider the place for next year now.
I had hoped to post this entry this morning, alas the Internet signal is a wee bit weak and I only just managed to download my emails, and that took two attempts.
Yesterday, after only an hours cruising, we arrived at out current moorings, which are between bridges 22 and 23 on the Ashby. According to the forecast today should be fairly calm with a few showers, so we’ll probably move along to Stoke Golding and, if we can’t get in there, we’ll carry on until we can find a reasonable spot.
And that’s it for this morning.
Friday 4.30 pm and we’ve had a beautiful late morning and early afternoon. Alas, the wind is now strengthening and the clouds have blotted out the sun, so I suppose we are now in for some rain.
This morning must have been one of the shortest cruises we have taken since leaving Mercia, the trip to Stoke Golding being only a mile in length and half an hour duration. Since about 10.30 this morning we have simply chilled out, our normal routine whatever the distance or duration of trip.
I am of the opinion that it will rain in the morning also, in which case we’ll stay here. For now though I’ll attempt to post this offering and wish you all well for the weekend.
All abreast from Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
This morning we took a walk in across the bridge to the local shop for the paper and a bottle of milk. Sadly, although the papers were in, the milk wasn’t, so Wifey took another walk later. Where we intend mooring up tomorrow, which is in the middle of nowhere in particular, it’s unlikely we’ll find a shop.
At lunchtime we spent a very pleasant hour or so sitting outside The Greyhound pub with drinks and snacks. The pub is situated at a spot called Sutton Stop, right at the junction of the Coventry and North Oxford canals. The place is named after the man who took the tolls at the stop-lock many years ago, whose name, unsurprisingly, was Sutton.
Looking towards the front of the pub from the Coventry canal towpath, you would see mooring bollards directly outside the pub, which are for the likes of daily trip boats. To the left of the pub is the aforementioned stop-lock, which is at the top of the North Oxford canal.
This lock opens into the small basin in front of the pub and, in order to access the Coventry canal, boaters pass under a bridge, turning left for Coventry and right for moorings and onward to the other end of the Coventry at Fradley Junction and the Trent and Mersey Canal, which is where we will be heading once we have taken a two c week run up the Ashby canal and back.
Our next mooring stop will be between Bedworth and Hinkley, but in a quiet area without much by way of habitation, except a pub called the Corner House Hotel at Bulkington, after two days of which we’ll be spending three nights at Trinity Marina on the Ashby Canal. After our disappointment with the Barby Marina we really do need a couple of days on a landline to charge our batteries. Happily the gentleman at Barby has forwarded the disc that Alan sent there for us to collect.
Saturday 3rd September.
We took our time leaving Hawkesbury Junction this morning, partly because Wifey wanted to walk to the shop for the paper, and partly because she also wanted to get some washing done. The fact that I also wanted to catch up on some much needed shuteye was also part of the equation.
We eventually set off at about 9.30 and, after just three miles, arrived at bridge 5 on the Ashby Canal. This bridge leads into the village of Bulkington and is one of those places we stopped at on our first cruise in 2007. In fact, looking back on Sheila’s diary for that year, we spent 12 days on this canal, much of the time passed away in pubs. Since we plan on being here for about two weeks this time, we could well surpass our record of seven pubs in total, with The George and Dragon at Stoke Golding being honoured with our presence twice. Although, as we’ve already covered The George and Dragon, we may well walk through to the village of Dadlington and The Dog and Hedgehog.
The first on this pub crawl will be at the Corner House Hotel right here in Bulkington tomorrow lunch time. On Monday we will be in Trinity Marina, where we plan on staying for three nights to charge our batteries on a landline. Believe it or not the marina has a pub, so we’ll be well on our way towards beating the previous record, and we’ll be only six miles into the 22 mile canal. No problem there then! Naturally I’ll keep you posted on our progress.
Sunday 4th September
Nasty, drizzly rain this morning and our wee pooch is unwell again. When her tummy is upset, she tends to hang her head and look really sorry for herself. Happily she soon gets over it and, by the time we got back from the Corner House here in Bulkington she was almost back to normal.
The Corner House is, as is usual in this part of the world, a big pub with a good sized car park. Unusually the place started filling up pretty early, no doubt because the meals are very reasonably priced, as are the drinks. Guinness is only £3.15p per pint, a nice change from some of the pubs we’ve been in recently. Unfortunately the cold pump wasn’t working and, as I suspected, since both pumps usually run off the same barrel, the normal temperature pump also gave up the ghost and I had to settle for a Guinness and Mild for the second one.
Actually that’s how I was first introduced to Guinness many years ago, by my ex-wife’s grandfather who lived in Surrey and made his own mild. In those days Guinness came in bottles, there was no such thing as draught. Like most young people at the time, I turned my nose up at the mere idea of allowing that mucky stuff into my mouth, much less my stomach. However, granddad insisted that I give it a try, but mixed with more mild than Guinness. Eventually, after many such visits, I was drinking 100% Guinness and haven’t looked back. So, that second pint, that had mild added, was a memory jogger.
Thus far, over the five months we have been cruising, we have spent a pleasant hour or so in 38 pubs. This equates to one visit every four days. Hopefully we’ll improve on that during the time remaining to us and get it up to two per week, or even better. We’ll certainly have ample opportunity along the Ashby.
Tomorrow morning we’ll be off to Trinity Marina which, if the price is right, might be a good alternative for winter 2012/13, since it will be about the same distance from Harlow as Barby which, as you all know, is not finished yet and didn’t look likely to be any time soon. We shall see!
Monday 5th September and I am sitting here, at 05.45, freezing cold in this tin tomb. Why? Because, as I have said in the past, our nice, new batteries are not fit for purpose. I have been running our engine for at least four hours every day, sometimes five hours and, on most mornings I am at least able to run the heater. This morning, with the batteries reading only 11.7 volts, the heater refused to start up.
Yesterday evening we watched just 2½ hours of television, that’s all, and our batteries have slumped to next to nothing. I won’t even be able to switch the Inverter/Charger on to plug the laptop in, because that would deplete them even more. In fact, when I do turn on the I/C it isn’t long before the lights begin to flicker, which is a sure sign that the I/C is going off and on and I have to turn it off.
With other boats moored nearby I can’t run the engine until 08.00, so we are unable to do anything electrical until then. It seems we are going to have to return to having six batteries instead of the current four. It’s just as well we’re spending three days and night at Trinity Marina from today, otherwise I doubt we would get back to Mercia without some serious problems. If I don’t see a marked improvement after that time we’ll be going back sooner than we would like. I am now wasting gas by having the cooker on to keep warm.
Well, that’s it for this entry, I’m too annoyed to write anything sensible for now. It’s just as well I charged the laptop yesterday while engine was running, otherwise I wouldn’t have been able to treat you all to a moan.
It is now 06.45 and I have just come back from walking the dog. The batteries are now reading just 10.5 volts. Wifey will be lucky if she can run the taps in the bathroom at this rate, and I am sitting here in a darkened boat because I daren’t turn any lights on. Nope, these batteries are not fit for purpose, at least, four of them aren’t. It seems we will definitely have to increase to six before we leave Mercia next year. At least then we should have enough overnight charge to run the heater.
Tuesday 6th September and I’m pleased to say I’m in a much better mood today.
We decided to leave Bulkington a little later than usual yesterday, to allow the big, working boats that had attended the festival at Shackerstone over the weekend, to pass us on their way out of the Ashby Canal. Leaving at 9 am, as we did, we hoped to reduce the amount of these bigger boats, at least by a few.
We were headed for Trinity Marina, which is just past bridge 17 and, even though we did come across a few returning boats, we didn’t experience any real problems with them. Trouble can arise when faced with one of these older, working boats, especially when they are towing a ‘butty’. This engineless boat can be as long as the one towing it and, if they are both 70 feet long and you meet on a bend, great care must be taken. The towing boat is unable to slow down and the man in control has to rely on the skill of the boater approaching. Almost all of these boats are of timber construction, so a collision with a steel hulled boat could cause serious damage.
After a five mile trip we arrived at Trinity at about 11.00, just in time to miss the rain and higher winds, which really rocked us later in the evening and during the night. Happily it had stopped raining by the time I took Rusty out a short while ago.
We are staying at the marina until Thursday morning, giving us 72 hours on the mains electrickery, which should be plenty of time to charge the batteries and, hopefully, see us back to Mercia without further problems. If not then, well, you know the rest. It really is great to be able to run the television and lights, along with the heating, without having to worry about being able to turn the heating on in the morning and charging the laptop.
When we arrived here we collected an info sheet regarding mooring fees because we are considering coming here for winter 2012. Alas, whilst their fees are similar to those of Mercia, they also demand a huge bonding fee on top of everything else being paid. On the example we found on the reverse of the info sheet this bond amounted to over £400. What we are asking ourselves is, why? It’s not as if we would be hiring a cottage or caravan with a whole bunch of stuff entrusted to our care. We are simply mooring up for the winter, what can we possibly do that requires a financial bond?
Nope, don’t think we’ll be coming here, this extra fee strikes me as a simple money maker, levied on unfortunate boaters to give the owners of the site a bit of positive cash flow. Needless to say, I won’t be posting this blog until we have left, just in case someone does a Paul from Pillings Lock and takes umbrage at reading it.
Today we’ll be taking the bus into Hinkley for shopping.
Cheers for now. More tomorrow.
Wednesday 7th September and, I’m pleased to say, that the wind has dropped and the rain has stopped. It’s now 07.00 and I’ve just returned from walking Rusty, who seems to be unwell again. She’ll be hanging her head again for a few hours and will refuse her food.
Yesterday we took a bus ride into Hinkley and the rain finally hit us, just as we were walking up the high street. Happily it didn’t last long and we managed the return trip without a soaking. The shopping area is quite spread and doesn’t have a supermarket anywhere that we could see. However, when the bus we came in on pulled away, his destination blind said ’Morrisson’s’, so even Hinkley is not free of the giants.
Today we’ll enjoy another pub lunch at the nearby Brewer’s Fayre.
Thursday 8th September.
Well, it’s still a bit blustery out there and we have to leave Trinity today, probably for Stoke Golding, which is about three miles away. But, if the weather turns really nasty, we’ll stop along the cut just as soon as we can.
We enjoyed a pub lunch at The Marina, the Brewer’s Fayre pub next to the marina and also next to a Premier Inn. It was one of their establishments that helped us out many years ago, when we drove into a severe blizzard crossing the Pennines. After seeing the lights glimmering through the snow storm, we pulled in and booked in for one night. By morning however, the snow was so deep as to be impossible to drive, and also impossible for snow ploughs to reach us. The management of the place kindly put us up and fed and watered us for a second night, absolutely free of charge. So, it’s always a pleasure to pay one of their outlets a visit when we can.
We’ll probably leave a bit later than normal, say about 10 am or so. This will give us time to dispose of rubbish, top up with water and get today’s Mail.
Friday 9th September.
We left Trinity at about 09.30 yesterday, after spending some time talking to a couple of other boaters, who agreed that this particular marina is not the friendliest of moorings. The financial bond was new to them, as was the £50 deposit for the access key to the steel gates.
At Mercia and Pillings Lock marinas we were struck by how friendly the other boaters were, nobody would dream of walking past you without a cheery ‘hello’. What a difference at Trinity, where quite a few people ignore you completely. What a shame too, because it casts a sad reflection on management of the place. After all, if your customers are happy it shows in their attitude towards others. It’s very much like being back in Harlow, where you only have to stray a few hundred yards from home, and you’ll be looked upon as a complete stranger. Sad!
Another boater, we heard, had already left for Barby Marina, what was he thinking? He’ll probably find himself waiting a couple of months for his pontoon to be built, much like the other half dozen boats we saw clustered together. The advert for that place has been running for at least a couple of months, with pretty artist’s impressions of what it will look like. Any port in a storm, or so they say, but it’s doubtful we’ll even consider the place for next year now.
I had hoped to post this entry this morning, alas the Internet signal is a wee bit weak and I only just managed to download my emails, and that took two attempts.
Yesterday, after only an hours cruising, we arrived at out current moorings, which are between bridges 22 and 23 on the Ashby. According to the forecast today should be fairly calm with a few showers, so we’ll probably move along to Stoke Golding and, if we can’t get in there, we’ll carry on until we can find a reasonable spot.
And that’s it for this morning.
Friday 4.30 pm and we’ve had a beautiful late morning and early afternoon. Alas, the wind is now strengthening and the clouds have blotted out the sun, so I suppose we are now in for some rain.
This morning must have been one of the shortest cruises we have taken since leaving Mercia, the trip to Stoke Golding being only a mile in length and half an hour duration. Since about 10.30 this morning we have simply chilled out, our normal routine whatever the distance or duration of trip.
I am of the opinion that it will rain in the morning also, in which case we’ll stay here. For now though I’ll attempt to post this offering and wish you all well for the weekend.
All abreast from Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
Thursday, 1 September 2011
Shiralee Cruise 2011 #26
Saturday 27th August.
Due to the heavy rain yesterday we decided to stay at Bridge 75 on the North Oxford. I do believe I called it the Grand Union in my last blog! See, this is what happens as you get old and wrinkly, the memory fades, and my dear wife knows all about my memory fading, poor wee thing.
So, what did we do with ourselves during our enforced stay, well, not a lot actually, we must have decided a dozen times or more to get the boat ready and move along, but each time we had a lull in the weather and started to make ready, down came the rain again. We set a deadline of 2 pm and, once that had passed, gave up on the idea.
Today however, regardless of the weather, we really must get ourselves to Rugby for shopping. Even more important is the need to top up with water and dispose of our rubbish. This I fear will be another drinkless Sunday, simply because after Rugby there’s nowhere to stop at or near a pub until we get to Hawkesbury Junction, where there’s a place called The Greyhound, the name of which engenders fond memories of my early Harlow days and the ‘Inn on the Park’, as we called it. The small Jazz band on Sundays was a true delight. Ah, memories, what would we be without them?
Sunday 28th August.
Bank Holiday is here again and, even on the cut, you get your inconsiderate people who just love waking their neighbours up in the early hours. Chatter, chatter, chatter at 3.30 am! And, as if that wasn’t enough, Rusty was sat by the back door at 4.45 am. So, having also woken up with a stiff neck, here am I, sitting at the laptop at 5.15 am thoroughly hacked off, and not just because of those two annoyances. I now have a warning that my battery is low and have had to switch the IC on, which I really didn’t want to do this early in the day. No! Going back to bed is not an option.
I avoided switching on the I/C yesterday morning and managed to do all I needed to do by the time Wifey got up, but I don’t think I actually used the laptop after arriving here at Newbold.
Yesterday, ah yes, yesterday, what a fun day that was. We left our moorings at 07.45 and headed for Rugby, which we arrived at by about 10.15, when we headed off to Tesco and such straight away. We first paid a visit to Homebase, where we found a great battery powered LED light to stick on the wall in the galley. We use up so many bulbs in the 12 volt system by leaving one on overnight – no, we’re not scared of the dark – that it’s becoming a wee bit expensive. It remains to be seen how long batteries last in this lamp before we revert to the previous system.
Tesco was a riot of fun because, it being a Saturday, everybody and his uncle were there for their Bank Holiday shopping. On top of which we were treated to the banshee screaming of a toddler whose parents simply let him scream. Talk about making a rod for your own back, will they be sorry later.
Having walked down the hill to Tesco without a coat, naturally the heavens opened up just as we were leaving the store. So, despite having taken the brolly with us, we waited for the shower to pass and headed off back to the boat. After a swift cuppa and more rain we headed off to pastures new, not knowing exactly where we would be pulling in for the rest of the weekend. In the event, and despite my fears that I would be denied my precious pint on Sunday, we found a spot at Newbold where there are no less than three pubs to choose from.
Yesterday afternoon Wifey took Rusty out for a walk and told me that the nearest pub had live music on. Hmmm! This does not bode well, I thought but, with the only disturbance being the one mentioned, we enjoyed more sleep than I expected.
My laptop battery is now up to 27% power and so, unless the heater turns itself off soon, I’ll have to switch the laptop off or make do with the 27%. When I turned on the I/C our batteries were down to 11.9 volts and this despite the engine being run for a total of 5 hours yesterday. Nope, these new batteries are not fit for purpose. Still, having missed out on Barby Marina for a full charge, we’ll try stopping at Limekiln on the Ashby Canal, but that won’t be until sometime next week. First we have to pay a visit to Coventry to top up our prescriptions.
Bank Holiday Monday 29th August.
Sunday was a joy. Aside from the odd shower here and there, this was a quiet and relaxing day with lots of boats tooing and froing, the drivers of some not seeming to care very much about moored boats. Still, we survived to see another day and have will be heading for Hawkesbury Junction this morning.
We had a choice of three pubs to visit yesterday and, in order to avoid those with Sky Sports on the big screen; we much prefer a peaceful Sunday lunchtime drink; we took a walk around to inspect all three. The first one we passed, The Newbold Crown, was the one we eventually settled for and is situated on the main road into the centre of town.
Guinness was about average in price at £2.40 a pint and from the menu we figured the meal prices to be pretty reasonable too. Had we been normal in our approach to food on a Sunday, we might well have ordered lunch there but, Sunday being our low food intake day, we had to decline the offer.
When we walked in at about 12.30 there was already a sizeable group of people in the Public Bar and just two eating lunch in the Saloon and, since the Saloon door was the one we entered by, that’s where we sat. The Newbold Crown is impressive in appearance from the outside and takes up the corner of the main road and a side street, with a very wide frontage and seating outside. Inside this pub is very clean and the owners are quite obviously very proud of their business. After half an hour or so other customers started drifting in and ordered food, so I have no doubt that this establishment will not fall by the wayside as so many others are doing of late.
This morning, what with the days becoming shorter as we head for the autumn, was another chilly start to the day, and I’m sure it won’t be long before we’ll be lighting our fire. With this in mind, just as soon as we get moored up we’ll be applying the finishing touches to the chimney, the tiling and grouting, and Sheila will be giving the fire and inner stack a coat of paint. In order to do this we’ll probably have to throw the windows, doors and hatch open to ensure we don’t suffocate from the fumes.
Hawkesbury Junction with the Coventry Canal is about 11 miles away, but there are no locks along the way. However, with it being a Bank Holiday, it is unlikely we would find moorings without some difficulty and so, instead of going all the way, we’ll try to find suitable moorings about half way there.
Tuesday 30th August
The weather wasn’t looking too clever when we left Neubold, so we decided to stop at Brinklow instead of going all the way to Hawkesbury Junction. We have spent a couple of days here before, but I’m sure there weren’t as many boats here on that occasion. It’s a bit like bridge 103 on the GUC, everybody and his brother now know about it and are taking advantage.
If I remember it right, the last time we were here we actually walked into the village, which looks to be about half a mile away. However, the road over the bridge ahead of us brings you to a T/Junction and, from there you have two choices for reaching the village. You either cross the fields and stiles, or you skirt the fields, which of course is the longer route. We chose the fields and stiles and almost got tangled up in overgrown thorny bushes for our trouble. This was all due to my determination to enjoy a pint or two.
This time though, since it was Bank Holiday Monday and I had already enjoyed my weekly allocation of Guinness, we decided against such a venture, which was just as well because I would never have made even half way.
When we pulled in to moor up we did so just as another boat was passing. Not having time to put our hooks in and tie up, we had to take the weight of the boat until it had gone by. For some reason, and even though I had done this many times before, I must have put too much strain on my left knee, which left me with an agonising limp for the best part of the day. By the early evening though, I’m happy to say, the pain and discomfort had eased off and all is now well enough for us to continue on to Hawkesbury.
Now, since it is another eight miles to Hawkesbury, and not wishing to subject me to the paint fumes, Sheila is going to leave me all alone on the stern deck while she paints the fireplace. She really can be so considerate at times.
Well, that was the last Bank Holiday until Christmas and, with a little luck the little perishers will be back at school soon, thus easing the congestion on the canals. Since we purchased Shiralee in 2006 more than 5,000 addition boats have been registered with BW. Taking into account the small percentage that have been scrapped due to their poor condition, that still leaves a great many more boats looking for mooring spaces during holiday times. It also accounts for why new marinas are springing up all over the waterways, and thank goodness for that. It now means there is more competition and more marinas are now willing to take in residential boaters for winter moorings.
Wednesday 31st August and we’re off to Coventry for a couple of days. The first thing to do once we arrive is to find the surgery and arrange for some medication, after that a look around the shops. My most important item is a 12 volt lead and plug for the television, after that I’m sure we’ll have other shopping to do, such as a loaf of bread and some milk.
I have not been able to find a full picture of the basin at Coventry, but what I did find shows it as being pretty big. Unfortunately we are only allowed 48 hours there, but that should be enough to take in as much as we need. We can always visit again next year, assuming we come this way that is.
Yesterday we enjoyed a Shared Platter at the local watering hole, The Greyhound at Hawkesbury, and very good it was too and, at just £9.95p, a bargain. With Guinness being just £3.15p I was well satisfied. Perhaps we’ll stop off again when we return on our way to the Ashby Canal.
In an effort to reduce battery power first thing in the morning, I am now running the laptop without connection to the 240 volt supply. This means I eventually find myself reduced to about 30% of battery left, which is when I then switch on the Inverter/Charger, and the system is working well so far. I also make sure the engine is run for a full two hours in the evening and, instead of 5 am I now rise at 5.30 am. This is because, having finished a couple of projects I’ve been working on, I can afford to sacrifice 30 minutes of my valuable computer time.
On Friday we will be returning this way and then heading on to the Ashby Canal, where we hope to spend a couple of days on a landline in Lime Kiln Marina, which boasts, among other services, a pub. Now, how fortunate is that?
Wednesday 31st August 5 pm
After much faffing about at Hawkesbury Junction, spending about an hour finding the nearest winding hole and heading back to the junction to top up with water and dispose of rubbish, we eventually set off for Coventry at about 9.15. The run down the five miles to the basin gets progressively more industrialised and overgrown, reminding us of a couple of other canals we’ve navigated this year, but also of the Aylesbury Arm of the GUC.
After a lot of meandering around loops and turns we arrived at the basin at about 11.15 and settled in for a well deserved cuppa, after which Wifey walked the dog. We then set off to find the nearest surgery, which we found had relocated to the hospital.
On our arrival at reception we were told that, due to a shortage of doctors we should instead walk round to the Walk-In Centre, which was just a five minute walk away.
Having filled in the usual form we were then sent round to a waiting room where we met Roger Whittaker, a very nice man who was visiting relatives here on a visit from Australia and was due to go home on 14th of September. We had a real friendly chat with him and he told us he had lived in Adelaide for the past 50 odd years. He also said his brother had terminal lung cancer and his other brother was suffering from dementia. The next couple of weeks are going to be quite tough for him, so I suppose he’ll be glad to return to the beginning of spring in Oz.
We were called in to see a nurse for an assessment before deciding if I needed to see a doctor. Now, anybody else in our position, which is that of spending six or seven months of the year cruising, would do well to avoid Coventry like the plague. As if it wasn’t enough being sent away from the first surgery, I was then told that they could only issue sufficient medication to see me through the next five days. As a diabetic whose condition is controlled with Insulin, this is not damn good enough. “It’s all down to budgets”, says the nurse, which of course is no good to me at all.
Anyway, we eventually came away with much more than she said we would, simply because Insulin pens come in boxes of five, and I now have more than enough to see me back to Willington.
Travelling boaters, you have been warned! Make sure you have plenty of everything medical before you even consider visiting Coventry. What a dump! Instead of spending two days we will be leaving tomorrow morning, just as soon as we complete our shopping, and good riddance to the place. Its only saving grace is the Motor Museum and, from what we hear, that will be closing soon anyway.
Friday 2nd September and summer made a welcome return yesterday. The day dawned bright and cheerful and remained that way for the rest of the day.
The trip through to Hawkesbury Junction too about two hours but it was far from easy finding somewhere to moor up. Although we moan about being limited to 48 hours at most places we stop at, with Hawkesbury being so popular and having a seven day limit, planning your arrival time really doesn’t help much. We are now moored well out of sight of the junction itself and it will be quite a walk when we visit the shop across the bridge, and when we return to the pub later.
Despite the fact that the summer holidays are almost over; I do believe some kids go back to school later this week; there are still plenty of boats moving up and down the cut. I’ve been up for just about an hour and already three have passed by. Can’t these people sleep? Obviously I’m not the only boater who likes to see the sun rise.
Being low on power again I have had to switch on the I/C unit, so I think that it’s a good time to post, but first I’d better make a cuppa for Wifey.
Cheers folks and have a good weekend.
Dave, Sheila and pooch.
Due to the heavy rain yesterday we decided to stay at Bridge 75 on the North Oxford. I do believe I called it the Grand Union in my last blog! See, this is what happens as you get old and wrinkly, the memory fades, and my dear wife knows all about my memory fading, poor wee thing.
So, what did we do with ourselves during our enforced stay, well, not a lot actually, we must have decided a dozen times or more to get the boat ready and move along, but each time we had a lull in the weather and started to make ready, down came the rain again. We set a deadline of 2 pm and, once that had passed, gave up on the idea.
Today however, regardless of the weather, we really must get ourselves to Rugby for shopping. Even more important is the need to top up with water and dispose of our rubbish. This I fear will be another drinkless Sunday, simply because after Rugby there’s nowhere to stop at or near a pub until we get to Hawkesbury Junction, where there’s a place called The Greyhound, the name of which engenders fond memories of my early Harlow days and the ‘Inn on the Park’, as we called it. The small Jazz band on Sundays was a true delight. Ah, memories, what would we be without them?
Sunday 28th August.
Bank Holiday is here again and, even on the cut, you get your inconsiderate people who just love waking their neighbours up in the early hours. Chatter, chatter, chatter at 3.30 am! And, as if that wasn’t enough, Rusty was sat by the back door at 4.45 am. So, having also woken up with a stiff neck, here am I, sitting at the laptop at 5.15 am thoroughly hacked off, and not just because of those two annoyances. I now have a warning that my battery is low and have had to switch the IC on, which I really didn’t want to do this early in the day. No! Going back to bed is not an option.
I avoided switching on the I/C yesterday morning and managed to do all I needed to do by the time Wifey got up, but I don’t think I actually used the laptop after arriving here at Newbold.
Yesterday, ah yes, yesterday, what a fun day that was. We left our moorings at 07.45 and headed for Rugby, which we arrived at by about 10.15, when we headed off to Tesco and such straight away. We first paid a visit to Homebase, where we found a great battery powered LED light to stick on the wall in the galley. We use up so many bulbs in the 12 volt system by leaving one on overnight – no, we’re not scared of the dark – that it’s becoming a wee bit expensive. It remains to be seen how long batteries last in this lamp before we revert to the previous system.
Tesco was a riot of fun because, it being a Saturday, everybody and his uncle were there for their Bank Holiday shopping. On top of which we were treated to the banshee screaming of a toddler whose parents simply let him scream. Talk about making a rod for your own back, will they be sorry later.
Having walked down the hill to Tesco without a coat, naturally the heavens opened up just as we were leaving the store. So, despite having taken the brolly with us, we waited for the shower to pass and headed off back to the boat. After a swift cuppa and more rain we headed off to pastures new, not knowing exactly where we would be pulling in for the rest of the weekend. In the event, and despite my fears that I would be denied my precious pint on Sunday, we found a spot at Newbold where there are no less than three pubs to choose from.
Yesterday afternoon Wifey took Rusty out for a walk and told me that the nearest pub had live music on. Hmmm! This does not bode well, I thought but, with the only disturbance being the one mentioned, we enjoyed more sleep than I expected.
My laptop battery is now up to 27% power and so, unless the heater turns itself off soon, I’ll have to switch the laptop off or make do with the 27%. When I turned on the I/C our batteries were down to 11.9 volts and this despite the engine being run for a total of 5 hours yesterday. Nope, these new batteries are not fit for purpose. Still, having missed out on Barby Marina for a full charge, we’ll try stopping at Limekiln on the Ashby Canal, but that won’t be until sometime next week. First we have to pay a visit to Coventry to top up our prescriptions.
Bank Holiday Monday 29th August.
Sunday was a joy. Aside from the odd shower here and there, this was a quiet and relaxing day with lots of boats tooing and froing, the drivers of some not seeming to care very much about moored boats. Still, we survived to see another day and have will be heading for Hawkesbury Junction this morning.
We had a choice of three pubs to visit yesterday and, in order to avoid those with Sky Sports on the big screen; we much prefer a peaceful Sunday lunchtime drink; we took a walk around to inspect all three. The first one we passed, The Newbold Crown, was the one we eventually settled for and is situated on the main road into the centre of town.
Guinness was about average in price at £2.40 a pint and from the menu we figured the meal prices to be pretty reasonable too. Had we been normal in our approach to food on a Sunday, we might well have ordered lunch there but, Sunday being our low food intake day, we had to decline the offer.
When we walked in at about 12.30 there was already a sizeable group of people in the Public Bar and just two eating lunch in the Saloon and, since the Saloon door was the one we entered by, that’s where we sat. The Newbold Crown is impressive in appearance from the outside and takes up the corner of the main road and a side street, with a very wide frontage and seating outside. Inside this pub is very clean and the owners are quite obviously very proud of their business. After half an hour or so other customers started drifting in and ordered food, so I have no doubt that this establishment will not fall by the wayside as so many others are doing of late.
This morning, what with the days becoming shorter as we head for the autumn, was another chilly start to the day, and I’m sure it won’t be long before we’ll be lighting our fire. With this in mind, just as soon as we get moored up we’ll be applying the finishing touches to the chimney, the tiling and grouting, and Sheila will be giving the fire and inner stack a coat of paint. In order to do this we’ll probably have to throw the windows, doors and hatch open to ensure we don’t suffocate from the fumes.
Hawkesbury Junction with the Coventry Canal is about 11 miles away, but there are no locks along the way. However, with it being a Bank Holiday, it is unlikely we would find moorings without some difficulty and so, instead of going all the way, we’ll try to find suitable moorings about half way there.
Tuesday 30th August
The weather wasn’t looking too clever when we left Neubold, so we decided to stop at Brinklow instead of going all the way to Hawkesbury Junction. We have spent a couple of days here before, but I’m sure there weren’t as many boats here on that occasion. It’s a bit like bridge 103 on the GUC, everybody and his brother now know about it and are taking advantage.
If I remember it right, the last time we were here we actually walked into the village, which looks to be about half a mile away. However, the road over the bridge ahead of us brings you to a T/Junction and, from there you have two choices for reaching the village. You either cross the fields and stiles, or you skirt the fields, which of course is the longer route. We chose the fields and stiles and almost got tangled up in overgrown thorny bushes for our trouble. This was all due to my determination to enjoy a pint or two.
This time though, since it was Bank Holiday Monday and I had already enjoyed my weekly allocation of Guinness, we decided against such a venture, which was just as well because I would never have made even half way.
When we pulled in to moor up we did so just as another boat was passing. Not having time to put our hooks in and tie up, we had to take the weight of the boat until it had gone by. For some reason, and even though I had done this many times before, I must have put too much strain on my left knee, which left me with an agonising limp for the best part of the day. By the early evening though, I’m happy to say, the pain and discomfort had eased off and all is now well enough for us to continue on to Hawkesbury.
Now, since it is another eight miles to Hawkesbury, and not wishing to subject me to the paint fumes, Sheila is going to leave me all alone on the stern deck while she paints the fireplace. She really can be so considerate at times.
Well, that was the last Bank Holiday until Christmas and, with a little luck the little perishers will be back at school soon, thus easing the congestion on the canals. Since we purchased Shiralee in 2006 more than 5,000 addition boats have been registered with BW. Taking into account the small percentage that have been scrapped due to their poor condition, that still leaves a great many more boats looking for mooring spaces during holiday times. It also accounts for why new marinas are springing up all over the waterways, and thank goodness for that. It now means there is more competition and more marinas are now willing to take in residential boaters for winter moorings.
Wednesday 31st August and we’re off to Coventry for a couple of days. The first thing to do once we arrive is to find the surgery and arrange for some medication, after that a look around the shops. My most important item is a 12 volt lead and plug for the television, after that I’m sure we’ll have other shopping to do, such as a loaf of bread and some milk.
I have not been able to find a full picture of the basin at Coventry, but what I did find shows it as being pretty big. Unfortunately we are only allowed 48 hours there, but that should be enough to take in as much as we need. We can always visit again next year, assuming we come this way that is.
Yesterday we enjoyed a Shared Platter at the local watering hole, The Greyhound at Hawkesbury, and very good it was too and, at just £9.95p, a bargain. With Guinness being just £3.15p I was well satisfied. Perhaps we’ll stop off again when we return on our way to the Ashby Canal.
In an effort to reduce battery power first thing in the morning, I am now running the laptop without connection to the 240 volt supply. This means I eventually find myself reduced to about 30% of battery left, which is when I then switch on the Inverter/Charger, and the system is working well so far. I also make sure the engine is run for a full two hours in the evening and, instead of 5 am I now rise at 5.30 am. This is because, having finished a couple of projects I’ve been working on, I can afford to sacrifice 30 minutes of my valuable computer time.
On Friday we will be returning this way and then heading on to the Ashby Canal, where we hope to spend a couple of days on a landline in Lime Kiln Marina, which boasts, among other services, a pub. Now, how fortunate is that?
Wednesday 31st August 5 pm
After much faffing about at Hawkesbury Junction, spending about an hour finding the nearest winding hole and heading back to the junction to top up with water and dispose of rubbish, we eventually set off for Coventry at about 9.15. The run down the five miles to the basin gets progressively more industrialised and overgrown, reminding us of a couple of other canals we’ve navigated this year, but also of the Aylesbury Arm of the GUC.
After a lot of meandering around loops and turns we arrived at the basin at about 11.15 and settled in for a well deserved cuppa, after which Wifey walked the dog. We then set off to find the nearest surgery, which we found had relocated to the hospital.
On our arrival at reception we were told that, due to a shortage of doctors we should instead walk round to the Walk-In Centre, which was just a five minute walk away.
Having filled in the usual form we were then sent round to a waiting room where we met Roger Whittaker, a very nice man who was visiting relatives here on a visit from Australia and was due to go home on 14th of September. We had a real friendly chat with him and he told us he had lived in Adelaide for the past 50 odd years. He also said his brother had terminal lung cancer and his other brother was suffering from dementia. The next couple of weeks are going to be quite tough for him, so I suppose he’ll be glad to return to the beginning of spring in Oz.
We were called in to see a nurse for an assessment before deciding if I needed to see a doctor. Now, anybody else in our position, which is that of spending six or seven months of the year cruising, would do well to avoid Coventry like the plague. As if it wasn’t enough being sent away from the first surgery, I was then told that they could only issue sufficient medication to see me through the next five days. As a diabetic whose condition is controlled with Insulin, this is not damn good enough. “It’s all down to budgets”, says the nurse, which of course is no good to me at all.
Anyway, we eventually came away with much more than she said we would, simply because Insulin pens come in boxes of five, and I now have more than enough to see me back to Willington.
Travelling boaters, you have been warned! Make sure you have plenty of everything medical before you even consider visiting Coventry. What a dump! Instead of spending two days we will be leaving tomorrow morning, just as soon as we complete our shopping, and good riddance to the place. Its only saving grace is the Motor Museum and, from what we hear, that will be closing soon anyway.
Friday 2nd September and summer made a welcome return yesterday. The day dawned bright and cheerful and remained that way for the rest of the day.
The trip through to Hawkesbury Junction too about two hours but it was far from easy finding somewhere to moor up. Although we moan about being limited to 48 hours at most places we stop at, with Hawkesbury being so popular and having a seven day limit, planning your arrival time really doesn’t help much. We are now moored well out of sight of the junction itself and it will be quite a walk when we visit the shop across the bridge, and when we return to the pub later.
Despite the fact that the summer holidays are almost over; I do believe some kids go back to school later this week; there are still plenty of boats moving up and down the cut. I’ve been up for just about an hour and already three have passed by. Can’t these people sleep? Obviously I’m not the only boater who likes to see the sun rise.
Being low on power again I have had to switch on the I/C unit, so I think that it’s a good time to post, but first I’d better make a cuppa for Wifey.
Cheers folks and have a good weekend.
Dave, Sheila and pooch.
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