A chat before moving on.

I had a nice chat with some holiday makers last night, they were on a borrowed boat moored in front of me and knew very little about the ‘workings’, the lady told me they could only use the loo in emergencies because they didn’t want to have to use a pumpout facility (emptying the tank) and they had no electricity because they didn’t know how to get it working, I offered to assist but they declined, she said they were coping with candles, oh dear, never mind they were in good spirits.

Before I left Fenny Compton today I had a chat with Sue (N.b. Kes) who was moored behind me, a nice lady who was about to set off for Cropedy or Banbury she was just going with the flow, so to speak, I set off about 9:30 and first stopped at the water point to top up, the weather was decidedly uncertain, it was long sleeved shirt, then fleece on, then waterproofs on, then waterproofs off, then fleece off, then fleece on, and so on.

Leaving Fenny Compton once you have passed the Marina you go through a section that used to be a tunnel (1000 yards) it is no longer covered but is narrow, I had to wait for an oncoming boat to pass through before I could go ahead.

Shears would come in handy, just room for one.

 A very rural run which seems to be typical of the Oxford, passing through liftbridge (141) which could be left open

Approaching

Leaving

and then down the Claydon Locks five in all (17-21) with no problems, I met a couple of boats coming the other way and had to turn a few locks (refill them to allow me to enter as I was going down on this occasion), a bit of a run to Elkington’s lock (22) with quite a few long term moorers around then down Varney’s Lock (23) where I waited for a boat coming up, I asked if Cropedy was busy and the answer was yes, his advice was to moor up after the next lock, Broadmoor Lock (24), so I was pleased to see a long space with pilings as I came out of the lock and I took the advice and moored up, it's just before the 'new' Cropedy Marina which opened in 2013.

I then took a quick walk down towards Cropedy (about half a mile) to get milk, he was correct it was busy but there were a couple of spaces I could have got in, as I walked back I again saw Sue (N.b. Kes) moored up and we had another quick chat, she was contemplating going further towards Banbury but just as I said cheerio it began to rain so she may have stayed put.

I will decide tomorrow whether to stay and look around or move on if the weather is ok.

Tonights mooring

Todays travel: 6 miles : 8 Locks : 1 Liftbridge