622 locks, 836 miles, 25 Tunnels, 37 swing bridges and 19 lift bridges since Nov 2006
It was a chilly 7deg C this morning when we set off for the Blisworth tunnel at 7am dressed in wet weather gear as we know what this tunnel is like. It leaks like a sieve from above. All went well taking only half an hour to get through the tunnel. When we arrived at Stoke Bruerne our progress came to a sudden halt due to us finding that the top lock was empty, so empty that you could see the bottom. That was not the worst of it, the pound below the lock was also completely empty due to some prat leaving the top gates open on the second lock. After securing that lock we then set about letting water down to fill everything up again. It was too early to ring BW and we knew what was required anyway.
Empty pound below Stoke Bruerne top lock this morning.While waiting for the pound to fill we found the diesel boat "Jubilee" moored opposite and enquired if he was open for business. His reply was that "If I am here I am open".
After about half an hour we were under way again. As we left the second lock another moored boat joined us down through the rest of the locks.The only problem we now had was that the lower pounds were over full with water flooding over the tow path causing us problems opening the top gates requiring us to waste water to get the top gates to open. While we were in the last lock 2 BW workers arrived as somebody behind us had rung them complaining about us holding them up. Apparently there were 6 boats behind us. There's no pleasing some people. Little did they know if it wasn't for us they would still be sitting at the top lock because the BW guys had come from Rugby which took the best part of an hour.
After a longer than normal trip today we found the mooring we were hoping for at Great Linford was available which meant I could do some more painting on the starboard side. I was only able to get half the painting done due to the metal being too hot to start off with and the willow tree over the bow of the boat was weeping all over the roof making it all wet and sticky. Never mind I will finish it off before we leave here tomorrow.
1 comment:
Amazing! I find it incredible that people would phone BW because they thought someone was being slow. Wouldn't you think they might have wandered down the towpath to see what the problem was. Some people are just unbelievable.
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