Wednesday 3rd July
Today we got off to a fairly leisurely start and travelled another 4.5 miles and 9 locks (single ones now) from Shrewley on the Grand Union Canal to Lowsonford on the Stratford Canal. We are actually only about 2 miles as the crow flies from where we were last night.
It has been dull all day and just as we were turning on to the Lapworth Link it rained quite hard. The Lapworth Link is the short piece of canal which joins the Grand Union with the Stratford Canal at Kingswood Junction. There are some moorings there so we would have found somewhere yesterday even if we had had to go that far.
We had 9 locks to do to get to Lowsonford and they are so narrow compared to the ones we have been doing since Braunston. We have been on the Stratford Canal before so we remembered the narrow locks and the split bridges where the towing rope used to go through when the boats were pulled by horses.
We joined the Lapworth Flight at lock 22, closely following another boat and with one closely following us. As we descended lock 24 a hire boat pulled up on the lock approach but no crew appeared. As we left the lock I left the gate open and went to ask them if they were going up because I knew there was a boat behind us. Inside the boat they were playing cards! A man was on the back deck having a fag so I asked him if they were going down the lock. He said they were so I told him to get a shift on as there was another boat coming.
At the next lock there was another hire boat just coming up. As I approached the lock the chap on the paddle started waving his arms about. I had no idea what he meant so when I got within earshot I asked him what he was doing. He said had I left the last lock open? I told him there was a boat going up and then one coming down and by the time he got there the lock should be in his favour. He then said could he leave me to it and got back on the boat while I did the gate and the paddles! I smiled nicely at his wife as they went past but she had a face like a well smacked bottom!
As they went towards Ken, who was drifting about waiting to come in to the lock, the chap pointed over to the left. Ken obviously thought he wanted him to go over there so he turned to his right. Meanwhile, what the chap had meant was he was going over to the left so they were now both heading towards each other. Ken was not a happy bunny!
They eventually passed each other and we carried on unmolested to Lowsonford. At lock 29 we caught up with the boat which had been in front of us (I think they had stopped for a cup of tea) as they were leaving it and he left the paddle up on lock 30 for us so it was full when we got there. We moored up opposite The Fleur De Lys and when we went over lock 31 to get to the pub we found he had left the paddle open on that one for us too. I don’t know how long it was before he realised we weren’t still behind him!
We are staying here tonight as it is a nice mooring. We were the only ones here to start with, it filled up at lunch time, emptied after lunch and it is now full again. Ken has been fishing and there was a bit of excitement when he was bringing in a bream as it was closely followed by a mink! The mink decided he couldn’t catch it after all and swam off.
Moving on tomorrow but not sure where to.
