Braunston to Hawkesbury Junction
Sunday 1st September
I have a code id my doze and I’b not very habby! Bud id
won’t stob be from enjoying a drink ad lunchtime!
Monday 2nd September
A really good day yesterday, with a slow stroll up the first
three locks for a leisurely drink at the Lord Nelson. Just for a change we
partook of a wee bit of gongoozling. To you landlubbers, that’s watching other
boaters pass through the lock. This can be great fun, especially when the boats
going through are holiday boats. There’s always one person on board who knows
everything about boating and then, by his own actions, proves that he doesn’t.
I also had a long chat with the boater who moored behind us
yesterday afternoon. He’s done the Kennet and Avon canal and gave me a cd of
photos he took while they were there. He also assured us that, contrary to what
we had been told, there are no problems with moorings along there, except that
there are times when you need to ‘walk the plank’. So, we just might make the
K&A one of our trips next year.
This morning has dawned bright and sunny and we’ll be off to
the bottom of Hilmorton Locks, about seven miles away.
Tuesday 3rd September
After a bright and sunny start yesterday; which stayed with
us for the rest of the day; we took a leisurely cruise down to the top of
Hilmorton Locks. This is the place, you may remember, where we were ordered to
stand in a queue at the local pub. As if! Anyway, after the usual faffing about
with walking the dog and drinking coffee, Wifey sauntered off to find the
nearest bus stop and newsagent’s as we needed to get into Rugby in order to put
my prescription in. The news was good, there were a couple of buses serving
Rugby and they ran every 15 minutes. The lady in the paper shop told Sheila to
ask for the Featherbed Lane shops on the way back.
After waiting almost ten of those minutes, the 3A arrived
and, by the most direct route possible – no round-the-houses for this one – we
arrived in town and did the necessary. It was rather warm and sticky yesterday
and, not wanting to stay long, we looked for the bus stop and took the number 3
back to Hilmorton, and that’s when the fun started.
The number 3, as opposed to the number 3A, does go all
around the houses and, after we had taken our seats, the next passenger on
asked for the place we wanted to get off, so we only had to wait for her to
leave the bus and we would ‘know’ we had arrived. Yeah, right!
The long and short of this is, just as the bus pulled away
after we got off it; at Featherbed Lane shops; we realised it wasn’t our stop.
However, sure enough, when we looked at the address on the bus stop, there it
was, as plain as day, Featherbed Lane and, equally sure enough, there was a row
of shops. Only, they weren’t the same ones.
So, we walked down the hill and, spotting another stop
around the corner, we decided that that’s the way the bus went and we continued
walking, thinking, quite wrongly, that this would lead us in the right
direction. But, as you have probably guessed by now, we were nowhere near where
we wanted to be.
Just across from our moorings is a transmission tower, which
we could see from where we were standing, and it seemed an awfully long way
off. So, after asking a very nice lady the shortest route to the canal, off we set
for about a mile trudge, arriving part way down the locks, with the prospect of
another ½ mile to the boat.
I think it’s only fair to say, that Stagecoach Buses should
know better than to give two bus stops the same designation, especially as they
were at least a half a mile apart. Both stops were in Featherbed Lane and both
had shops nearby, so a stranger to the area could easily make the mistake that
we did. The usual practice is to give the bus stop the name of a nearby street,
but not Stagecoach, oh no!
Now, because of that error, we will be going down the locks
this morning and moving on to Newbold, and then going in to Rugby to pick up my
prescription. From past experience, we know where the bus stops are at Newbold.
Lesson learned, methinks!!
The transmission tower I mentioned earlier is directly
across the field from us, but my WiFi unit icon is now showing as being OFF.
The unit itself, however, is fully functional and has been working perfectly so
far this morning!
As I write this the darned thing has switched to normal
function. Perhaps a faulty laptop? Now, there’s a surprise
Wednesday 4th September
Yesterday morning we made our way through the three locks at
Hilmorton and went on to Newbold, a distance of just four miles, where we moored
up and had our caffeine fix before wandering down to the local Co-op for bread
and such, then checking bus times into Rugby. We’ll go back to Rugby today to
collect our prescriptions.
When we go to Rugby this morning, we want to have a really
good look around the town, because there’s so much we didn’t see on our earlier
visit from here. I’m particularly interested in finding art suppliers, because
Rugby is the main town we’ll be visiting while we’re at Crick marina. Of
course, the other big town reachable from Crick is Northampton, which may also
have such a shop and we’ll certainly be visiting that town.
Thursday 5th September
After our sojourn into Rugby yesterday; where we didn’t
manage to find an art shop; we returned to the boat to engage in some R&R
for the rest of the day. We had thought to maybe have a pub lunch, but it was
far too hot to even consider walking the short distance required. But, that’s
no problem as we’ll be at Hawkesbury Junction for the weekend.
We did hear from Sandy and Andy though and they managed to
brighten us up. It seems that, even though they are already somewhat dearer
than Crick and other marinas, Mercia have raised their mooring fees by 3.5%,
which means that, if we include the charge for postal deliver; which is free at
Crick; then we’re saving over £50 per month by moving. I do believe our friends
are a little jealous but, since most of Andy’s work is around the Willington
area and the marina, they have no choice but to stay there. We know they are
staying in the marina for the month of September, but what they’ll do after
that, we don’t yet know.
We’ll probably move on to Brinklow this morning, or maybe a
couple of miles further, then Hawkesbury on Saturday morning.
Friday 6th September
I sometimes wonder just what CRT do with our licence fees, I
really do. When we left Newbold yesterday morning, our intention was to moor at
bridge 26, the same place as when we came through some time ago. However, it
came as something of a surprise to discover, that the whole of that stretch was
already taken, so we were obliged to continue on, towards Hawkesbury.
We finally managed to pull in between bridges 11 and 12,
which entailed a further four miles of travel and, by the time we reached this
spot, our wee pooch had all four legs crossed, poor wee thing. And the reason
for having to push on this extra four miles, weeds!!
You see, we are pretty careful about where we moor up. Much
of the canal system, except for recognised mooring spots, can be quite
hazardous for mooring, due to rocks that lay under the water and out of sight.
So, unless there are obvious signs of it being safe to do so; such as flattened
or mown grass; we try to steer clear of them. The place we are at now already
had a boat moored there and there was the usual strip of corrugated metal into
which we could use our hooks, otherwise we would have had to continue on to
Hawkesbury.
Oh dear, the promised rain has turned up although, as I
write this, it has stopped, albeit temporarily. If, as the forecasters have said,
it continues to rain, then we’re unlikely to go on to Hawkesbury. We’re about
two miles away from there, at a very quiet spot, with just one other boat
moored behind us, and so, since it’s only Friday, there’s no particular rush to
go anywhere.
Saturday 7th September
Yesterday was our 7th anniversary living on ‘Shiralee’,
doesn’t time fly. The early part of the day was marred by rain and it didn’t
look like we would get away from our out-of-the-way moorings but, around about
11 am the rain stopped and, although it was a wee bit drizzly, we headed off
for Hawkesbury, where we arrived at about midday.
Apart from settling in and drinking coffee, we disposed of
rubbish and did nothing much else for the rest of the day.
This morning we’ll be heading off for the Ashby canal, where
we’ll spend a week or so, before we set off to meet Alan and Chris at Stone.
So, until next time, take care and have a great weekend.
Dave, Sheila and Rusty.
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