Left at 09:00
arrived at 14:30
Very bright and
breezy today , slept well till about 3ish, then the dogs were up and down,
don’t know what was the matter, I think they
are a bit confused again now Niamh is here, they should settle down by
tomorrow. Derek up as usual, me dozing
till Derek put the engine on to start the warming of the water, at 9. Niamh had
slept like a log, she hadn’t been disturbed by us and the dogs in the night,
she woke up when the engine rattled into action. Derek decided it would be Warwick for water
and Tesco, Royal Leamington Spa for Niamh and me to have a shopping fix. Only 2 locks today so we can rest our aching
shoulders, I even have a bruised toe with the weight pushing against my
sandals/trainers when opening and closing yesterdays heavy gates. Derek says on NB had set off up the flight
this morning. The water point is just in
front of the 2 locks, there is a pub at the side of the top lock called The
Cape of Good Hope, it has NB Chesterton moored in front of it and some of the
windows have some NB/canal scenes painted on them. There is what looks, from the front, a very
thin house, when you look from the side it’s a really decent sized property,
very new and made to suit its situation with balconies and windows to look out
on to the canal to view the comings and goings.
At the lock side is a little brick building its “Get Knotted” a
rope/chandlers property, there is also a little NB Athena moored right by its
side, I think it must belong to the owners of the properties, they have a big
black Labrador retriever and a little jack Russell who were sat at the side of
the building and then the boat and played with one another. The paddles are the same as on the flight, we
don’t know yet what they are called, a kind of hydraulic we thought, but its
like a giant screw inside, so Derek says its not hydraulic?? Two boats went in the lock as we weren’t
quite ready, they went down and a single hander was coming up. We gave him a hand (found out he lives at
Cropedy) one of our favourite places, then we went in and 2 came up, so it was
a busy pair of locks. I had asked the
single hander about letting the paddle down by itself, which is what most of
the men doing them had been doing, he said just to knock off the horseshoe shaped
lock, which is on a chain, then it slowly slides down, not damaging the metal
rod. He also said what not to do,
showing me one of his hands with blackened finger nails, ouch. I gave it a try and managed to do it, that
was a first but I was still not sure
this would be a regular occurrence.
Through bridge 46 Derek and me went to Tesco armed with out trusty
trolley, when we got back we had lunch, Derek went for petrol for the generator
and we set off for Leamington Spa. We
crossed over two aquaducts, which had white iron railings by one side and brick
walls at the other side. It seemed very
civilised on this bit of the Grand Union Canal, urbanised with lots and lots of
waterside apartments. Niamh and me went
into the town (or is it a City)we walked
through a very rough and ready,run down part of Leamington and walked right up
to the posh part, where there are some lovely buildings and pretty floral
displays. The Park looked lovely and had
memorials and lots of lovely water features, apparently there is a restaurant
in there,we didn’t actually venture inside though. We had a drink in a lovely little cafe The
Bandstand Cafe, it overlooked a grassy park with, you guessed an ironwork
Bandstand. The cafe was beautiful, all
painted furniture, mostly upcycled (the modern term for done up) and the walls
were all papered with parisienne looking papers, it had proper tea pots, china
tea cups and sugar tongs for the sugar lumps??
Even the Loos were lovely!! It
started to rain, it was only a light shower, we had our brolly, we ventured
into the posh bit then wend our weary way back to the canal and the boat. Derek didn’t want to stay in the town so we
then moved further down it was 4ish. And hopefully we would find a better
mooring, probably join a swarm of NBs further down the canal. We stopped at 4 40 just beyond bridge 35, and
yes there were other NBs, one being Epiphany, the NB who runs a blog and which
Derek follows. Tea was cold meats and
our now famous wok chips and beans, followed for Derek and Niamh with Knicker
Knocker Glories? (Cake, custard,fruits and squirty cream) Fruit and cream for me. All this served in tall glasses with a long
spoon to eat it with. These were thought up and named when Niamh
was on an earlier journey with us, she’s a true Bell with a sweet tooth and a
liking for puds and cake. Niamh is
drawing, Derek snoozing and we are all watching tele.
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