Saturday 11th and Sunday 12th May
Saturday morning I was woken from a lovely deep sleep by a boat passing by really early. Ok, so it was actually 8-20 am! We didn’t hurry ourselves to get out and about but we still got our planned tasks done by early afternoon.
It was still fairly windy and there was a threat of rain but we carried on undaunted with the sanding under the gunwale and then touched up the blacking. We only have this opportunity to do the painting because when we leave here we will be mooring on the Port side again. And then it will be time to touch up the paint we did last week!
With the blacking and sanding done we went off to the shop and the pub of course. Just after we got in the pub there was the first of the blustery showers that had been forecast. These continued for much of the afternoon and evening with winds touching gale force at times. Fortunately we managed to make it home from the pub during a brief lull between these showers.
I was just dosing off in the chair in front of the fire in the afternoon when there was a huge roar of wind and a banging sound on the roof of the boat. We leapt up and discovered that the parasol stand containing the pole with the tv aerial and satellite dish on, had been blown over and was sticking out at a jaunty angle across the tow path! We had to go out in the wind and pouring rain to stand it up again. That gust of wind must have been really strong because the parasol stand had a bag of coal on it to weight it down (it now has 2) and it still blew over.
A blustery night ensued and it was still fairly blowy when we got up this morning. It was dry though so we carried on with painting the red under the gunwale. Apart from a few flies stuck in the paint it now looks as good as new. Next painting jobs – the front including the gas locker lid, the back including the hatch, the cratch and finally the roof. Then we can start on the inside!
This afternoon has been awful weatherwise and we have been holed up indoors watching cricket and keeping abreast of the football scores. Norwich are safe now, hurrah! It was touch and go there for a while though!
Tomorrow we are going to Banbury on the bus. We can’t leave here until Tuesday because CRT are doing some work on Claydon Locks tomorrow. Mind you, have just seen the forecast and it looks as though the wet and windy weather is continuing well into next week. May have to stay here longer than we thought!
