Starting with a splash

On Tuesday morning, before Grace and I were even out of bed, Michelle fell into the canal. Well, she washed one leg very thoroughly, and badly bruised the other knee.

"It's certainly one way to avoid locking!" I joked. She glared at me. She really enjoys the job, and wasn't going to be best pleased with having to watch me do it on my own - though I can be very entertaining!

It was a day of clouds...

and cows.

We moved on to Rugby, stopping for a short while to shop at Tesco. The stretch beyond, between bridge 59 and the aqueduct, has been very nicely restored where it used to be a badly broken bank. OK, it wasn't possible to moor there before the fix, but it's a shame that the opportunity wasn't taken to make this long stretch into a good 48-hour mooring.

Newbold Tunnel was still unilluminated. They really ought to replace that fuse! We stopped at Easenhall Bridge 34 to eat. Over lunch, there was much discussion about what we'd do when we met the Coventry Canal. Left to Coventry to see the cathedrals and whatever else we might discover Coventry has to offer, or right to the Ashby Canal? Michelle hadn't seen the city before, and would have liked to see the cathedrals at least, but her knee wasn't holding up very well, and there was some doubt that she'd be able to do the walking. I made the executive decision to turn right. How rubbish would it be to do the 10-mile journey in and out of Coventry with Michelle not being able to benefit from being there?

As it happened, we were able to moor at Hawkesbury before the junction. Every time we'd been this way before, that bank was totally full of boats. We moored close NB Ottawa whom we'd moored next to the night before. Another boat filled the gap between us. The young lady from the boat introduced herself as Isabelle, the social media manager of her dog, Tony, who tweets as @tonyonaboat. Tony follows me on Twitter. I follow him now, too. Well, I already follow @BoatHorseCracker‏, the boat horse on the Montgomery. I can't be specist, can I? Not at all PC!

A shout, "Grace and Roger!!" made us hurry to the side doors in time to see Sandy and Dave - the Fairies - go past, waving and calling out. They were with another boat that was ahead of them, so they couldn't stop to catch up, which was a great shame. They were on their way back to Barby from a trip to Leeds. Eleven weeks in total. Lucky them!

We ate at The Greyhound Inn, down at the junction, an excellent meal in a charming old building, then returned to Kantara for a sweltering evening of card games.