Thursday 10th May
Yesterday wasn’t very exciting, we stayed at Kingston for another day and went in to town where we just did a bit of shopping in Millets – Trainers for Ken to replace his squeaking ones which were driving us mad and a nice warm top too, which I spotted for £20 (reduced from £35) in the sale. I bought a new waterproof coat, also in the sale, to replace the one which I have had for years and which has now lost it’s waterproofing and has a broken zip. This turned out out to be a good move because the forecast was totally wrong today and this afternoon, instead of the promised warm weather, as soon as we started doing the Wey it absolutely peed down!
So today we continued our journey to the Wey Navigation. To get to the junction we had to travel about 8.5 miles and pass through Moseley and Sunbury Locks. We had to wait at Thames Lock, at the start of the Wey, until 2 pm for the lock keeper to finish her lunch so we filled with water while we were waiting (shower tonight, hurrah!). This was when it started raining. Before we could go on to the Wey we had to buy a visitor pass which for 7 days cost £68. At the moment we are only allowed to go as far as Worsfold (about half way) because the rest of the navigation is flooded. We live in hopes that we will be able to make it to Godalming before our pass runs out! The Basingstoke Canal is also closed but we weren’t going to go down there any way.
Once through Thames Lock we travelled another, very soggy, 2 miles and 3 locks to New Haw Lock and moored above the lock. In the information leaflet we were given it says you can moor anywhere suitable but so far it has been difficult to find somewhere suitable. There don’t seem to be any metal pilings to use chains with and a lot of the banks are subsiding. Where we are at the moment is ok, it is deep enough but we have had to use spikes and cut a large amount of vegetation from the edge so George can see where it is to get on and off. And Barbara had to cut away a large amount of vegetation to stop the creepy crawlies from getting in the windows and invading the boat! Mind you that pales into insignificance compared with the sub-aqua mooring we had to do at Kingston!
By the time we had moored up it was time to cook dinner so you will be surprised to learn we actually haven’t been to the pub today, even though there is one in close proximity to where we are now!
Not sure what tomorrow’s plans are.
