What happened to Spring.

5 Locks, 3 Miles, and 1 Tunnel now moored back at bridge 70
Total of 195 locks and 183¹/₂ miles and 5 Tunnels since 5th Nov 2006

Cranes lock is not a good overnight mooring due to the noise of the trains only a couple of hundred yards away so we decided to return to bridge 70. The morning started out wet with occasional showers so as we were in no hurry we decided to wait for another boat to come through in either direction to making locking easier. About mid morning a Tillerman hire boat came through heading north so as they left the lock in our favour we moved off. Luckily the rain stopped but it was very cold. At Pyrwell lock we were surprised that the lock was against us even though a boat had not long passed through which should have left it in our favour but both Cranes lock and Pyrwell lock have serious leaks in the top gates and self fill in a very short time. Two locks up at Kibworth second lock we came across 2 BW workmen repairing the side paddle post so we told them about the leaks but they appeared to know about them. Ah well we did try and do our bit for the cause.
We decided to stop for lunch near bridge 74 and try and thaw out for a while. After this we passed through the Saddington tunnel again before finally mooring back where we stayed 2 nights ago.
The Saddington tunnel is dead straight so you can see right through it but as you travel through you can see that the walls are far from straight being curved in numerous places all the way along. Apparently when it was built they had lots of trouble with the unstable shale hence the tunnel varying in width in places.

We have been amazed at the fertility of the local sheep around here as we have never seen so many ewes with triplet lambs. We know they are triplets as the farmers paint numbers on the ewe and lambs so they know which ewe had which lambs. They must be very profitable for the farmers.