Marsworth Reservoir

And the next day started chilly with several sprinklings of rain and a gusty, gutsy wind. After my half-hearted attempt at removing the bird-poo from the boat using bucketsful of canal water, Grace gave the job a three-quarters-hearted go with hot, soapy water. It now requires a wholehearted attack with a hose, sponges, soap and chammy leathers. That can wait until we get back to the marina.

The boat bearing the injured crew left long before us the next morning. It was gone 11 o'clock when we set off past Bulbourne and on to Marsworth Top Lock. Imagine the surprise of all four of us when along came Daisy, the couple we'd shared the same flight with on our way up. What a coincidence! They'd travelled at quite a pace, about eight hours a day, and been down to St Pancras Marina. The weather was getting warm and sunny as we descended together, swapping tales of our travels, and we enjoyed a fast descent, aided by three very willing vollies.

We moored next to each other below lock 46, right next to Marsworth Reservoir. The weather was now really beautiful, though there was a very strong wind which made mooring rather problematic.

After a quick sarnie lunch, Grace and I went for a walk around the Marsworth and Tringford reservoirs. It was very windy, but quite stunning!

The footpath took us onto the Wendover Arm of the GU. We did a reccy of the end of the navigation. Though the canal originally extended beyond this point to Wendover, it suffered the fate of many canals decades ago and got filled in. Time was, anyone wanting to take their boat to the very end of this stretch had to turn at a winding-hole about half a mile from the end and reverse the rest of their bendy way, since there was no place to turn at the end. Now there's a good-sized winding hole at the top, and a few decent moorings.

We walked the length of the arm back to its junction with the GU at Marsworth Top Lock.

At the junction, we turned left back down the path to Kantara. This is a beautiful walk to do, highly recommended.

The sunset was phenomenal.

Powerless!

While everyone else was having a lazy Bank Holiday Monday under the sun in parks and gardens, in canalside pubs, sunbathing on the grassy areas around locks, or cycling maniacally and sweatily along the towing-path, or running ditto, we left our Winkwell mooring, winded below the next lock, and made sedate progress up the locks towards Berkhamsted. The locks tended to be slow to fill/empty, and/or leaking, and/or had iffy winding mechanisms. But we had no need to hurry, and it was too hot for that anyway. We would have liked to get to Berko before all of the moorings were taken, but we're ideologically opposed to rushing. Suffice it to say, however, that it took us around an hour and a quarter to cover the distance we'd walked up the canal in half an hour the day before.

We arrived at our destination at around half-past three, finding the one remaining space after dallying below Gas 1 lock, having that "Well, we could moor here. We don't want to pass up a mooring down here and then find there's nowhere to moor above" debate.

We needn't have worried. The mooring above had our name on it.

That's Kantara, fourth boat down!

Berkhamsted was full of  people having a lazy Bank Holiday Monday under the sun in parks and gardens, in canalside pubs, sunbathing on the grassy areas around locks, or cycling maniacally and sweatily along the towing-path, or running ditto.

We awoke the next morning to a no-power situation. Our battery bank was registering 12.1 volts on the monitor when we went to bed, but the fridge must have taken that down to the cut-out level during the night, so now we had no water and no heating - all of them have electric pumps. I filled a water-carrier from the water-point opposite and put the kettle on for tea, and bread under the toaster. Then the gas ran out! Okay, no problem. Switch to the second gas bottle (and for goodness' sake remember to buy a replacement!), and sit back to enjoy tea and toast.

At 8 o'clock I ran the engine to recharge the batteries and, within thirty minutes, systems were restored and we had cold water to flush the loo and for drinking. After an hour, we had hot water for showers, and I no longer had an excuse not to do the washing-up. We moved on after I'd been shocked by the coating of bird poo that had been splattered over Kantara by birds in the tree above us. Shocked into washing the boat. They'd made a really good job of it.

The other side was even worse!

A strange mixture of cloudy sun, bright sun, rain and various strengths accompanied us up to Cowroast Lock. Here we met a couple on a share-boat who'd not long descended the lock but were now wanting to turn around and go back the way they'd come. These unfortunate folk had both sustained injuries which were too painful to continue with. Their logistical problem was that the nearest winding-hole was the one we'd turned in earlier, back at Winkwell - five miles and fifteen painful locks away, after which they'd have to do the same 20 lock/miles to get back to where they were now.

However, there is a winding-hole above Cowroast, so they shared the lock with us, reversing in as Kantara slid in beside them. It's quite odd to see two boats facing opposite directions in a lock! Out of the top of the lock, they continued in reverse, first to the water point, then to the winding hole. We carried on while they were taking on water, and they came along later and moored for the night close to us.

It was a rainy night, with rising winds.

An oddity we passed on the way!

Easter weekend at Winkwell

On Thursday we only had three locks to descend into Berkhamsted.

We left our mooring later than intended and were rather alarmed as we came out of the last lock to find that there we no moorings in sight. We tried two. One was inches too short. The other, we discovered, had four-hour time limit. To the rescue came the skipper of Miss Matty, already moored, who pointed out a space further along, and kindly offered us to breast up to them if that space wasn't adequate. It was a nice offer, but not needed. The very last space before the next lock was fine.

It was warm, sunny, and very boaty.

Fav boat name of the day - Dreckly. And another, as a sort of sub-title to the actual name (which I didn't even notice!) - Pre-dementia adventure.

Sign on garden gate to very nice house alongside a very pleasant mooring spot. "Warning! Very noisy dogs live here! Just so's you know." Some clever psychology being applied there.

Good Friday breakfast was our traditional Hot Cross Buns - excellent ones from nearby M & S. We spent the day chilling under a hot sun (if you see what I mean). The playground opposite sweltered with small children wearing out their parents, while quiet couples murmured hand in hand along the towing path, and family groups walk slowly along, stopping from time to time to place bets on which child was going to fall in next.

It's a Bank Holiday. It's a hot and sunny day. It's a lovely place to be.

On Saturday morning, we moved down to Winkwell, nine lock/miles of pleasant, uneventful cruising. The mooring below lock 60 was almost empty, and we tied up at a lovely spot with the canal on one side of us and the River Bulbourne on the other.

The peace was momentarily spoiled just as we were about to sit down to dinner. Kantara lurched suddenly away from the bank, and hung at an unusual angle. A sure sign of the water level having fallen. Windlass in hand, I ran down to the next lock, expecting to find gates left open, paddles up, water pouring out of our pound at a scary rate. This was not so, however. The lock was filling, a boat rising within. I dashed back to the lock above us, cheered on by merry drinkers at The Three Horseshoes. The pound above this lock is quite long, so I was reckoning on being able to let quite a lot of water down into our pound without affecting boats above us. One gate paddle raised at one top gate and one bottom one, I watched a little nervously as the level rose. Frequent looks at the level above the lock assured me I wasn't causing boats up there to be grounded.

Eventually, Kantara and her one neighbour floated free, and the mudbanks on the off-side of the canal were once again well submerged. Drama over, though we still had no idea why our water had fallen so much, nor whether it might happen again - possibly during the night. I spoke with the crew of the boat that had just come up and moored near us, and told them what was going on. They had just come up from Hemel Hempstead and each of the locks had been left open, apparently by the boat ahead of them. That explained the problem, and it didn't happen again.

Shortly after Sunday noon, Naomi and Eddie, Jess, Steve and Karolina joined us at The Three Horseshoes for lunch, just 100 yards or so away from where Kantara was moored. It's a lovely, 16th century pub.

The food was excellent, the only downside being that the servings of the Sunday Roast were so large that we had no room for dessert!

After that, a long time of catching up with each other's news, a good walk and a deferred dessert - delicious chocolate brownies of Karolina's making - they all drove off back to St Albans, just half an hour away. It had been a really good afternoon.

And on we go...

Fenny Stratford to Soulbury Three Locks, to Linslade Tesco, to bridge 109, to Slapton Wharf, and then to Marsworth Bottom Lock on Tuesday. Progressing slower than usual, and loving it. Drama free, stressless, cold but getting warmer. Then came the drama.

Okay, it was only a minor drama. We set off alone up the Marsworth Flight on the foggy Wednesday morning,

and got stuck almost immediately. Literally stuck! The pound above our first (bottom) lock was very low, and Kantara grounded as Grace tried to ease her out of the lock. There's only one thing to do in this situation. Unless there's a vollie around, then you let them do it for you! I opened a top gate of the next lock, Grace took Kantara back into her lock, and I closed the gates in front of her to protect her from the coming deluge. Then it was a matter of opening one paddle in the bottom gate of the lock above us and watching the ensuing flood, waiting for the water to rise enough for Kantara to pass through and into the second lock. Fortunately, the pound above the second lock is a longish one, and draining that much water out of it didn't make too big an impact upon it. It's always a danger!

Drama over, we carried on up the flight. At the next lock we met NB Daisy from Wyvern Shipping Co., out for ten days on a trip down into London, and we shared locks up the rest of the flight. It was easy going, and the weather was really good by now. Enjoying the locking too much, I neglected to take any photos. There were a couple of vollies around who might have taken the load off for long enough for me to take a few snaps, and they did indeed promise us three times that they would prepare the next lock for us. They did the top lock.

It was well past lunch time, and we were very thirsty and hungry, so we paused below Bridge 135 for refreshments, continuing afterwards, now without Daisy, down through Cowroast, Dudswell and Northchurch locks to moor for the night just above Bushes Lock.