A Wounded Soldier - 4 July 2018

Wednesday 4th July 2018
St Neots to Great Barford
7.75 miles, 3 locks

The day started off well with yet another balmy morning and a great big 'garden' for morning Monty  ablutions.  It was during the game of ball that things went awry - Monty came racing back at his usual high speed but with some blood on both front legs/feet. He had a cut just behind the dewlap pad on his left front leg.  We cleaned it up and decided he did not need to see a vet, but instead of walking across the bridge to Waitrose with him, we pushed across the river in the boat and I nipped in to get the paper and a couple of other bits we forgot yesterday.

Monty was a bit subdued - he rarely lies down on the back deck, but he was just feeling sorry for himself and I suspect was looking for sympathy! - more news later in this blog.

Three locks and all three were against us.  The first at Eaton Socon had this note on the electronic control box - now does that fill you with confidence that it will work? No?  Me neither!  It was open when we arrived and did close, so all good so far.

The slackers on the Vee gates took so much turning (53 and 55 turns up and then down again) I called on Chris to give me a hand to get the lock ready for us.

A cautious approach as there is quite a good flow of water coming from Chris' left and he had freshly painted rubbing strakes to protect!

The bridge over the lock must go somewhere as we saw around 20 dogs with owners crossing it on their morning perambulations.  Once the boat was in I went down to operate the gate with my fingers tightly crossed - it worked first time, so something was going our way today.

Past the mooring at Eaton Socon where there might have been room for us, but we were happy where we had moored. 

Shortly after that lock you pass a very large golf course - as we passed something small and white fell into the water - if it was a bird it did not come out again, so we assume someone lost their ball.

On the far side of the golf course is a large area of water equipped for water sports with, what looks like, a giant slide. 

For the most part we were travelling through pretty idyllic countryside completely devoid of moving boats.

Yet more warnings about water levels at Roxton lock.

This lock has only been here since 1972

Both this lock and the next at Great Barford have vee gates at both ends with no bridge over the lock, so a lot of walking round is required.  It is at times like this that we most miss our boating partners! I know it is hot, but I almost felt I had done as much work on these three locks as I do on all of Tardebigge's 30 locks!  At least there you can get a rhythm going.

 More information was forthcoming about the Cardington lock closure at Great Barford - but we have since heard that it has been fixed and is fully open again.  Apparently some mindless idiots saw fit to vandalise the electric control box.

We only saw one boat moving and that was leaving Great Barford lock to moor up as we approached the lock.  We moored up ahead of them (nb Alchemy) and then discovered that they had over wintered in Droitwich Spa Marina last year and hope to do so again this year.

After a very swift lunch they moved off leaving us plenty of room to choose our spot

Peeking through the bridge there are cows trying to keep cool.

So how was Monty?  He seemed to be okay.  The wound looked clean and we are fairly sure there is nothing in it (we are assuming it was discarded glass). We did go for a short walk back to the lock, over the bridge, and he seemed fine, and 

where we also got a good view of Tentatrice

They say the grass is greener on the other side - in this case it was!

 Once back we turned the boat round so we could open the side hatch for much needed air with this as our view.

Our entertainment for the evening - an intrepid couple out for a swim.  To be honest it looked quite tempting as it was a very warm evening. (Unfortunately, or was it fortunately, at least for the natives, we forgot to pack our swimming gear!)