Friday 30th
May
At last no
rain!
Leamington
Spa to B24 Long Itchington
6.5 locks,
10 locks
A fairly
leisurely start and a day with no rain – bliss.
We managed to pair up for most of the locks, so a good journey.
Approaching the staircase locks 15 & 14
A moment of excitement for us – at Fosse Wharf we
passed nb Ferndale – the first boat to recognise we are fellow bloggers and say
hello. Thank you and we hope to meet you properly one day!
At the last corner coming up to B24 at Long Itchington we encountered a traffic jam of four boats - a ‘moored’ boat had come adrift and was across the cut.
Apparently the ground is very soft here at
the top and then like cement further down, so we were advised to moor on rings, not mooring
pins, which we did – two boats behind the boat (nb Iolanthe) that accompanied
us most of the way today.
We are both heading off at 10 am tomorrow to the
Cuttle and Stockton Locks. We will be at
Braunston tomorrow where we will meet up with nb Cleddau and hopefully the crew
of nb Jannock will be meeting us all for dinner. I need to get rid of a lot of mud tomorrow!!
Once we had
moored we went for a wander into Long Itchington which looks to be a lovely
village with some fabulous properties both old
and new
With a village
pond
This looks like a church, but is called the New School House
We missed the festival!
We patronised this one
If you do
stop here it is a fair trog to the village centre – turn left after the village
pond, go past the church and you will be rewarded with a fairly well stocked
Co-op.
We have never seen 'Big Pink Lorries' before, but in this small little village we came across three of them. . You cannot miss them and the two that we came
closest to had very considerate drivers.
The first moved across to the middle of the road to give us good space
on the fairly narrow path and the second stopped to let us across a zebra
crossing with a big smile on his face. Such a pleasing change from so many motorists attitudes, so many thanks to them.
Saturday 31st
May 2014
We made it!
B24 Long
Itchington to Braunston Turn
9.25 miles,
13 locks
Running
total since leaving Droitwich 55 miles, 111 locks.
As planned
we headed off at 10am with nb Iolanthe
and had a very pleasant trip up the first
10 locks – the weather was warm and dry and the company excellent. We hope to meet you all again one day, Dave,
Patsy and the dogs Jazz, Trigger and Pixie.
Thank you for your help and making our lives a lot easier. We bade them farewell at the top of the
Stockton flight as they had planned to stop before Calcutt. As ever things change and they didn’t, so we
joined them again for the first two of the Calcutt flight – we then stopped to
get diesel. I wonder if anyone leaves their rubbish here?
Heading for the last lock
before the run to Braunston. I busied myself and‘de-mudded’ the inside
of the boat! The going was slow (good
for me as it gave me more time!) – we have never seen to many boats on the move. At first we thought this swan was protecting his new family, but there was no hissing or aggression, so I think he was just after algae.
Soon
enough we got to Braunston Turn and there was Boatwif (nb Cleddau) waving to us
from the bridge – what a welcome sight.
Round the bend and lo and behold the Captain and Cleddau.
With a mooring space right behind them just big enough for us
Tea and cake
were consumed, then a quick wash, brush up and change and Brenda and Graham (nb
Jannock) arrived armed with a plate of savoury Chelsea buns. We are looking forward to those for lunch
today. Thank you Brenda and thank you both for driving over to join us for the
evening which we all enjoyed very much. And so to The Boathouse for what was a surprisingly good dinner at a very reasonable price - 2 mains for the price of one!
Having seen the amount of boat movements today I think we were very lucky to find one mooring, never mind two! I hope this good fortune follows us the rest of the way.
So the main
part of this summer’s cruise begins.
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