Thursday, August 18, 2005

August rush

We are being woken up in the early hours by moving boats. We stopped at Penkridge for lunch and several boats rushed past. Set off and joined the queue at the first of two locks. Much help provided by young energetic students from the boat behind. We had done our daily quota of 10 lock miles that day so tried to moor opposite the prefab houses but grounded on a mud bank. A local resident suggested moving back as it is always shallow there. 'So why don't BW dredge it' I wonder. There is only ½ mile to the next lock so the water level rose and fell many times that evening causing the boat to lean over.

Next day we got to Baswich, near Stafford and stopped again for lunch under the shade of a tree. It was another hot day. Then on later to Tixel wide and were very lucky to find a space. Unfortunately a tree prevented Sky reception.

We are in need of water so set off to fill up at the junction with the Trent & Mersey canal. Left early thinking of the many boats heading north to the Boat Festival but found the water point free. Ann went off to get the post while I got on with filling the tank. The two locks in and beyond Great Haywood were very busy with a queue of 4 boats going down. Counted 12 coming up at the next lock. The last in that queue would be waiting at least 2 hours to get through! We continued to the aqueduct over the river Trent just before Rugeley.

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