We're loving this!

Moving off from our Stoke Bruerne mooring on another beautifully clear and sunny morning, we stopped for a slow water refill. The slowness was fortuitous, however, for it gave time for another boat to arrive at the top lock, and we descended the flight with them smoothly and easily, with two crews working the locks together. The all-male crew were moving a hire-fleet boat down to Uxbridge. I didn't quite understand why.

After a short stop at the services at the bottom, we sailed on just another couple of miles to a really picturesque countryside spot where tiny lambs bleated plaintively and geese honked boisterously, and we all basked together under a warm sun.

Sheep and geese both provided us with a lot of entertainment throughout our stay there.

Friday's best boat names were Tiny Tardis (I had a peek inside. It was just as small as you'd expect. I think something was wrong with their time/space regulator) and Nunc est bibendum - "Now is the time to drink". Since this is writ large on both sides of the boat, you have to think that the crew might be permanently drunk, but the skipper did seem to be fully in command of his craft.

It was another lazy day for me,  Cosgrove being the only lock. This is a route we've taken several times now, but we still enjoy it enormously. What did disappoint us was the discovery that GDad's has closed down. GDad's Collectables was such a fabulous emporium, and we were sure to pay it yet another visit on our return journey. That was not to be.

However, a poke around the internet resulted in finding this piece of good news...

...so we live in hope!

Just beyond an unusual scene of 14 swans a-grazing (in a field of some or other young crop), we moored at Bridge 75, northwest of Milton Keynes. The grassland either side of the canal has been developed since we last moored here, and is now a huge and pleasant park, crisscrossed with paths passing play areas for kids and benches for the less energetic.

There was frost overnight, and we woke to the sight of white-sprinkled fields. A couple of hours later, the temperature had risen, and we chugged off down through Milton Keynes. I think the town gets an unfair bad press. It's actually a really nice place as seen from the boat. It has some very attractive houses, a lot of open space and parkland, and playgrounds for all ages. The canal's treated with respect, valued, an important part of the pulse of the town. I like Milton Keynes.

We had a brief stop at New Bradwell for a visit to the Co-Op, and lunch, and finished for the day at
Fenny Stratford, right above the 11" rise lock.

Despite the chilly breeze, we investigated the village, looking for the Tesco where we could buy things we'd not been able to get from the Co-Op. Fenny Stratford is a very strange, dead-feeling place. It has no identity of its own, and has actually been absorbed by Bletchley. It's run-down and sad. It was Saturday, but most shops were closed. Many of those permanently. There were very few people about. The railway looked unused. We were glad to get back to the boat.

From our two meetings with local gentlemen, we discovered that we were moored opposite Kantara's former mooring with her previous owners. Each of them told how Bob had had enormous problems with several successive domestic generators, and this explained perfectly the issues we had with the last one he fitted before selling Kantara to us. If only we'd known then...

It wouldn't have stopped us buying her, believe me! It  would have saved us lots of pounds.

Sitting on the well-deck minding my own business that evening, I was accosted by a very belligerent pair of really quite attractive dogs. After the owner had persuaded them to desist and go away, he apologised and I asked him what breed they were. "Malayan Terriers," he said, "but I call them Malayan terrorists!"

I can't find that breed anywhere on the web.