We have just returned from a couple of days away in the Capital where weather conditions were ever so slightly better until yesterday morning. We awoke to find that it was again snowing and by the time we left to catch a train back to Rugby there was another 2 inches of snow on the ground. Despite serious transport disruptions in South and West of London we managed to get back to Rugby without too much hassle. The only problem at Euston was that an overhead power cable had been bought down earlier in the day. By the time it was fixed there was an hours back log of of trains to sort out and get back onto schedule.
Travelling backwards and forwards to London it was interesting to see where the canals were frozen and where they were not. The Grand Union appeared not to be as heavily frozen as the Oxford Canal but there are a lot of streams and by washes that flow in and out of the Grand Union keeping it ice free in places.
As the diesel boat is still ice bound at Sutton Stop I had to head off down to the boat yard for another 40 litre’s of diesel to keep ourselves operational. I will return tomorrow for another 40 litre’s and that hopefully will keep us going until the diesel boat arrives. At the boat yard I saw the results of staff trying to move boats around in the ice. They had managed to get 1 boat out into the main canal channel by a mere boat’s length which took over an hour of backwards and forwards ramming into 4 inch thick ice. After moving just 2 boats in the yard they gave up as the whole exercise was proving pointless.
There are signs of the thaw beginning but we feel that it is going to be at least a week before conditions improve sufficiently to be able to move. Even then we will probably just wind and travel back to Clifton Cruisers for a pumpout and Brownsover to restock the pantry. We cannot see ourselves doing any serious cruising before the end of the month at least.
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