Friday 27th march
Today we did our onslaught on the 13.5 miles and 17 locks from Thurmaston, through Leicester, to Kilby Bridge. We didn’t leave as early as we would normally have done because we had arranged to do the first 5 locks with Jeff who was going to moor up at Castle Gardens for the weekend. He had a doctors appointment and we left at 9-30am in the end.
Before we left we went and said goodbye to Barry and Barbara, we will see them again later in the year. So, we did the first 5 locks with Jeff and left him on the straight mile. We had a stroke of luck at Freeman’s lock because there were a couple of CRT chaps there and they operated it for us.
After that it all went tits up because it became evident that as we had to empty all the locks we were following someone, bugger! We eventually caught him up at Whetstone Lane lock. He was just leaving as I appeared, I waved and he waved back. I thought oh good, he’ll wait at the next lock now he knows we are behind him.
Err wrong, no he didn’t wait. By the time we got to Dunn’s lock he was nearly up it. He emerged from the undergrowth (call of nature) and we chatted. He wasn’t paying attention to his rope and as his boat ascended it became jammed round the bollard. He pulled and pushed and kicked it. I pulled it while he kicked it and vice versa. We rocked his boat but there was no way it was coming loose. He had to cut his rope in the end.
He asked me how many more locks there were to Kilby Bridge, I said 3 but there were actually 4. Anyway, off he went and I thought this time he will definitely wait for us.
Err wrong again. When I got to Bush lock he was leaving. I was getting fed up now because I had to empty the locks before we could use them. At the next lock (Ervin’s lock) he said he had waited at the previous one but didn’t see us coming so thought we had stopped! Silly old fool. I said no we hadn’t stopped and yes we were going to Kilby Bridge.
We managed to get to our penultimate lock, Double Rail lock, before he got in it so we eventually shared one, hoorah! As he was leaving I said if he didn’t wait at the last one there would be trouble! He did and we arrived at Kilby after 8 hours of travelling.
Needless to say we were soon in the pub having a pint and fish and chips.
