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.

Almost back!

It was warm, cloudy and humid when we started out today. The moisture in the air held the smells of the countryside, and it was lovely - grass and leaves, hedgerow flowers, some wood-smoke from somewhere. Autumn's colours were beginning to take hold of the trees. It was a sensual morning.

We carried on down the Oxford Canal. The approach to Stretton Stop was lined on both sides by boats, the cutting beyond it bordered with ancient trees that formed a canopy over the water.

Beyond that, open fields, sheep and cows by the hundred, geese by the gang, a huge field of Christmas trees numbered in thousands.

We noted yet again today the huge increase in the number of women at the helm of their boats. Yet still we hear the old, sexist comments like the one to me; a man on a bridge, watching Grace drive Kantara into a lock below him who called out to me, "Bloody hell! Do you trust her to drive that?" To which I answered, "Why would I not?" His reply doesn't merit the space here.

Or the man at a lock telling me, "You shouldn't be doing that! You're the skipper."

"No," I said, "I should be doing this, and my wife's the skipper - as she should be!" He said nothing, but gave me a pitying look. The progeny of misogyny. 

Newbold next. The Quarry Pits, sadly hidden from view from the canal, then the 250-yard Tunnel, still without the coloured lights it had four years ago.

And on to Rugby, a 20-minute drive from the marina, but two days by boat on the winding canal.

After lunch at the bottom of Hillmorton Locks, I was greeted by vollie Maurice Farndon, "The Man with the Golden Windlass".

"Ahh," he cried, offering me his hand, "the man with his feet under water! Nice to see you again!"

I can imagine Marice is like that with all of his regulars. He sets the standard for volunteer lock-keeper service. That he liked my book makes him even more special!

Up we went, then, through the three locks - the busiest locks on the canal system, Marice tells me -  and on to Braunston, 7 miles further on.

Arriving there, we were surprised and dismayed to find the visitor moorings full, breasted two or three deep in places. There must have been a weekend event here. Roy and Lee were working on a boat moored next to Roy's' NB Wells Fargo, and Roy invited us to moor abreast it. We'd overshot by then, could have reversed, but carried on and nearly regretted having done so. All of the mooring spaces were occupied from the junction bridge to Butcher's Bridge, almost a mile. We passed Simon, fixing something on the Gongoozlers' Rest. Then we came to the very last boat length before Butcher's - and it was empty, and we took it gladly.

If we get up early tomorrow, we should be back at the marina by the end of the day.

Day 7 - wet!

Yesterday it rained, it poured, it pissed down. So we stayed where we were. There was no point in getting wet when we don't have to be anywhere in particular by any specific time. So I went for a couple of walks, and we cosyed in for the day.

On one of my walks, I saw a terrapin in the canal. I knew that they are to be found in canals, but have never seen one before. It is thought that they have been introduced into the system by owners who are fed up with having their fingers bitten, but they are something of a nuisance in the canals as well, since they kill newts and fish and other canal creatures.

Today, we had to move. Rain was threatening, but we started the journey dry. We moved just 600 yards up the canal to take on water, and to do some shopping in the Newbold village Co-Op. Then, with the rain just beginning, we moved off in search of an Elsan point, finally finding one while it was raining hard. Moving on from there, the rain persisting now, we looked for a suitable place to moor for the night.

We found it, but didn't reckon on the ground being so soft, and the mooring pins being very loose. I've had to employ two very large pins, driving them into the ground through the D-rings at the top of the normal pins. We seem to have run aground a bit, too, so our mooring ought to be secure!

Miles today... just seven. Blame the weather!