Rediscovery Cruise: Day 3

We woke to blue skies and sunshine.  Boats were moving pretty early, many of them hire boats going back to base at Napton or Calcutt.  After breakfast, we walked up to Napton to go to the village shop, which is very well stocked.  Back at the boat we moved round to the water point to fill the tank and wait for Catherine, Nigel, Grace, and Matthew who were coming to help us up the locks.  They parked near Bridge 115 and walked down.  It wasn’t long before we were entering the bottom lock, at around 10am.

There was lots of uphill traffic, so progress was pretty slow, with a couple of times where it made sense to wait for downhill boats rather than add another boat to the pound above the next lock.  After a couple of locks, Matthew was keen to get on the tiller, so he steered the rest of the way.  In the slightly longer pound between locks 13 and 14, we met a boat on an awkward bend, but Matthew expertly slotted us through the gap.  The man steering the other boat called out to me ‘he did well’; I said Matthew knew what he was doing — to which the other steerer replied that he himself didn’t!  Why he didn’t tell Matthew rather than me that he’d done well, I’m not sure.  About half way up we wondered where the water buffalo were, when we came to several fields of them

At the top of the locks, we moored off the end of the proper moorings, as that was the only space there was.  Catherine had brought lunch, so we had a picnic-type feast.  There were also chocolate brownies, although we’d also had some of them during the lengthy pauses up the locks.

The family headed off back to their car a bit after 2pm, and we set off again round the twists and turns of the summit pound.  It’s mostly very pretty.

We passed the boat which floats in a little pond just off the canal; a glamping wigwam with an outdoor bath that has a chimney — so is it heated somehow?; then massive works for HS2 which will soon enough blight the countryside round here.

We moored in a popular spot a little beyond Ladder Bridge.  The massive radio mast is over the towpath hedge.

The battery problems continue, with one of them being much too hot.  We waited for it to cool down, and have disconnected it.

7 miles, 9 locks.  (40 miles, 29 locks)