To blacking: Day 1

Adrian came up to the boat yesterday, with a holdup on the A34 making it a very slow journey. I came up after an early shift at work. It rained pretty much all night, and the forecast wasn’t good for today either. This morning started with a car shuffle, and on the way back we went to the Gayton car park where we picked up our friends Helen and Andy who were spending the day with us. We drove back to the marina, and set off. It was dry if gloomy, but still with some autumn colours.

At the bottom lock at Stoke Bruerne a couple of lockies emptied the lock for us. A pair of boats was coming down, so we could leave the gates open.

With crew and lock keepers we made good progress up the locks, with the cloud gradually clearing too.

The long pound was very low, which is unusual. At the top the headed straight into the tunnel. We passed two boats, the second of which hardly moved over at all, and gave us a significant whack as it went past. At the Blisworth side of the tunnel, the improvement in the weather was significant. 

We moored at Gayton for lunch — but while checking down the weedhatch, I managed to dunk one leg on the canal!  Not sure exactly what happened as I stepped onto the tow path, but I reckon it would have been worse had Andy not been there to grab hold of me. After lunch, Helen and Andy headed off to their car in the car park by the bridge. It had been a really lovely day with them. We set off again, to make the most of a lovely sunny afternoon. 

At almost 5.30 we were at Nether Heyford, with the sun beginning to disappear behind the hill. We moored up shortly after the narrows where there’s decent piling. 

15 miles, 7 locks.