From blacking: Day 1

I drove up to Weedon yesterday after an early shift, stopping at Brent Cross Tesco on the way for some shopping, and arriving at about 6.15.  Steve at Grand Union Narrowboats had kindly moved the boat over to the towpath side before he went home.  It was dark by the time I arrived, so I couldn’t really see much of what had been done.  I soon had the hot water on, the fire alight, and a pizza in the oven.

This morning I was up in good time and could have a look at the blacking, the repainted top plank, and the new raddle red on the gunwale tops.  It all looks very smart.  Steve has also fixed the broken hinge on the bow locker lid.

I took the car down to our marina — the traffic was terrible on the A5 so Google took me cross country to the A508, and even that was very slow approaching our turning, and that’s a mile from the A5 roundabout which causes the delays.  I got an Uber back to Weedon, then had a chat across the canal to Steve before setting off.  I’d only been going about 20 minutes when I stopped at Rugby Boats for diesel.  They were preparing to get some boats out of the water, so I had to stop alongside one of them.  I set off again into the rather murky morning, although it was also very still.

The boat seemed to be moving particularly well today; maybe the new blacking means it cuts through the water better.  I saw no moving boats until Bugbrooke, when a boat set off from the pub moorings in front of me.  Then boats started coming the other way too. The old farm building by Banbury Lane Bridge is having lots of work done on it.  It’s not just the scaffolding, where you can see through the doors and windows, there’s major work inside and in the farmyard beyond.

I kept catching up with the boat in front, so I decided I’d stop for a few minutes for lunch.  I was hoping for a space at Gayton Junction where there are rings but it was completely full.  I should have just stopped opposite, on the empty long term moorings like we did on the way up.  I eventually stopped after bridge 49 at Blisworth, and put the kettle on and made some lunch.  I was only there for maybe ten minutes as I ate lunch on the move; I was pretty sure I’d catch up with the boat ahead before the locks anyway.  In the tunnel, I could see the boat ahead of me and I was about 5/6ths of the was through before I saw them get to the other end.  I did the tunnel in 24 minutes.

The boat ahead was at the lock landing as I arrived.  It was a share boat with three people on board; the lady was showing some American tourists how the lock worked, and then got them to help open and close the gates.

I’d planned to stop in the long pound after the top two locks, but the other boat said they were going all the way down so I thought it would be daft not to keep going with them.

We made good progress even though all the locks were against us.  Even the really slow draining one didn’t seem to bad.  I moored at the bottom of the locks; the was only one other boat here, and even that has now left.  The owner came back from work and I thought he was just going to run his engine, but in fact he set off.  There were also only a handful of boats above the locks, and only a couple in the long pound.  As the towpath is on the side that’s away from the pontoon in the marina, I washed that half of the roof, to get the workshop grime off, and also did the windows.

12 miles, 7 locks.