Once again the curse of the lack of 3 signal struck yesterday so here are another 2 for 1
Thursday 14th October
Today we travelled 10 miles and 5 locks from Market Drayton to Norbury Junction. Fortunately I was suffering no ill effects from having to carry the shopping yesterday but my cold was still in evidence (aah). The 5 locks at Tyrely were all set against us but as it was calm Ken was able to get off the boat and shut the lock we had just come out of while I went and got the next one ready. A system which worked really well and we made good progress.
We arrived at Norbury Junction just after lunch and we were freezing as the weather had taken a bit of a turn for the worse. As it was pretty chilly Ken said he wasn’t going to sit outside the pub with George so we left him at home, bless. In the pub were – yes Cathy and Mick! They must think we’re stalking them! We had a couple of pints and a chat, as you do and decided that as we were ultimately going to the same place (Mercia), at the same time (Nov), we would probably, more often than not, end up in the same place at the same time when we moored up in the afternoons on the way there!
Friday 15th October
My nasty hacking cough kept me (and Ken) awake half the night and my chest hurts now, aah. Modern cough medicines don’t seem to be man enough for the job and I was in danger of falling asleep while sucking a cough sweet and choking myself to death!
Today we were going to get to Brewood, go to the pub and then move on to the rural moorings just outside but by the time we got to Wheaton Aston we had had enough. It wasn’t very warm today and we have done a lot of travelling (for us anyway) lately so we are well on track to get to Mercia for Nov 1st. That said we have done 7 and a half miles (but no locks).
We didn’t leave very early because we had to call at the boatyard and get diesel, gas, coal and water. Talking of getting water, I made an interesting discovery while I was doing just that this morning – our two hose connectors, which we thought didn’t fit the tap, actually do fit the tap! I found they have a piece which unscrews to reveal a larger orifice which will screw on to the tap nicely, hurrah!
We were further held up by several long lines of private moorings along the route, which means slowing down to tick over as you pass, making the journey a lot longer. So we arrived in Wheaton Aston after lunch and finding plenty of moorings we decided to stop.
As we didn’t take George to the pub yesterday and it threatened to brighten up we took him to the Hartley Arms. It didn’t, in fact, brighten up, so we were a bit chilly sitting outside but never mind. George spent quite some time trying to extract a peanut from the crack between the paving slabs. In the end I had to get it out with a key before he dug the whole patio up!
This evening Ken has had a successful fishing session, catching a couple of large chub and a nice bream. More fish scales and slime in the kitchen! Oh, and mysterious flies keep appearing in the boat …………….. have some maggots escaped I wonder?
God knows where we will end up tomorrow.
