Summer, what summer?

0 Locks, 6 Miles. Now moored above bridge 130.
578 locks, 717½ miles, 18 Tunnels, 37 swing bridges and 19 lift bridges since Nov 2006

At breakfast the weather was only a light drizzle but as soon as we decided to cast off the rain became more persistent. It was a fairly uneventful trip except for meeting boats at bridge holes, 3 in all.

We stopped for lunch at Fenny Compton as we had arranged to meet an Australian couple, Tom and Jan Jones. Tom had been emailing me for some time on the subject of getting a narrowboat built incorporating some ideas of his own. I had given him my thoughts on what would or couldn’t work and on different products that I was aware of. Tom and Jan are here visiting their son, having a narrowboat holiday which was affected by the recent flooding and visiting a few boatbuilders to discuss ideas. They will be returning home with a some what better idea on boat building and can come up with a design that suits them best. Before they left they very kindly drove me to Tesco’s at Daventry to get some provisions.

Good luck guys and thanks, keep in touch.

By about 3pm the weather improved so a decision was made to put a few more miles behind us which now puts us within 6 miles of the Napton flight. Along the way we spotted n/b Aotearoa who passed us at Fenny Compton so we moored behind them with the intention of doing some serious damage to some bottles of wine that we had been given by Tom and Jan and our good mate Maffi aka Milly M.

We are still hearing of some horror stories of people stranded on the Thames in the recent flooding but don’t let that put you off going onto the river. They say the recent flooding was a once in a 100 year event. Let common sense prevail. We have been on the Thames many times with different conditions prevailing and at no time felt in danger. We have just kept an eye on the long range weather forecasts and taken advice passed out by the lock keepers along the way.