Thursday 15th August
To start with this morning was one of those rare times when everything comes together nicely. We were having our cup of tea when Ken decided to start filling the water tank, in case someone else turned up to use the tap he said. I said there were 2 taps but as he quite rightly pointed out the flow rate would be halved if another boat came and used the other tap at the same time as us and it would take ages. Or if 2 boats got on the taps before us it would take even longer. I remembered how long Black Pearl and the other boat had taken to fill their tanks at the same time yesterday.
While the tank was still filling he went off to do his ablutions leaving me in charge. It then started raining so I thought, ‘Oh great, when the tank is full I’ll have to tit about outside, with the hose, in the rain, in my pyjamas!’ Then a Black Prince came down the lock and of course they wanted water. ‘Oh even better, I will have to tit about outside, with the hose, in the rain, in my pyjamas, with an audience of hire boaters!’ I thought.
But as they were using the other tap ours slowed down and didn’t finish filling until Ken, all dressed, was available. It had stopped raining by then as well and the first Black Prince had been replaced by another one. I did my ablutions, emptied the loo and the rubbish and we were getting ready to go when Quiet Woman (brilliant name and a picture of a Queen with no head) came down the lock and wanted to get water. We said we would soon be off so they waited to go in our space, meanwhile another Black prince was then coming out of the lock and I managed to get them to leave the gates open for Ken to go straight in. We went in the lock and Quiet Woman went in our space, it all turned out very well!
We were entertained whilst doing the lock by a chap telling us stories about the antics of his dog, a Fox Terrier/Jack Russell cross. A really cute looking little dog who thinks she is a Rotweiller! She likes to see things off from his garden particularly badgers apparently!
The first mile or so of our journey after York Street Lock was fraught with danger as we encountered several more Black Prince and a Canaltime, usually through bridges or on blind bends and the first lock we came to was occupied by a Viking Afloat with the driver (dad) on the phone and the child labour (crew) all over the place, bless! At Caldwall Lock another hire boat was occupying the upstream lock approach, not making any difference to us because we were going up but it’s just what they do!
We stopped at Tesco’s in Kidderminster for a small stock up and then carried on to Kidderminster Lock where there was a bit of a hiatus while the hire boat we had passed at Caldwall Lock and who had then passed us while we were in Tesco’s, waited for a boat to come out of the lock so they could go up. There were also another 2 boats waiting to come down.
At this lock you have to wait downstream under the road bridge and it can be a bit tight for boats travelling down if there is more than one boat waiting because there is a bend soon after the bridge making it difficult to pass. The next chap to come down was worrying about being able to get past in his 68ft boat. I assured him we were the only boat waiting (which we were at the time) so there was no problem but just as he came out of the lock another boat came up behind Ken so he ended up having to do a bit of a tricky manouvre!
After 4 hours, having only travelled 5.5 miles and done 4 locks we arrived at Wolverley and moored downstream of Wolverley Lock. Because we are in a tree lined sandstone cutting there is no phone signal here, no tv signal and no satellite signal either. But there is internet as you can see and there is also a pub, hoorah!
Tomorrow we are probably going to Kinver.
