.......when bad becomes good..... and reverses....and
reverses again.
I set off first this morning at 8:15 as I needed to top up
the water tank and the water point was just before the lock ahead of our
current morning, I arrived to find a hire boat moored on the water point so I
pulled onto the lock landing and got both my hoses out, having unrolled them
and connected them together I was about 5’ short of the tap, so I knocked on
the roof of the hire boat and them commenced to reverse back alongside them
tying my boat to theirs and walking across their boat to get to the tap, a lady
appeared and said “ sorry, we are just about to move” so I said “not for the
next half hour as I am now filling my tank”, she was ok about it, they were in
the wrong not me, then hubby appeared and we had a chat as my tank filled, just
as it was finishing filling Karl appeared and so they helped us through the
lock, all good in the end again.
 |
| Gates being closed by water point infringement couple. |
 |
| Dundas Arms, nice pub, but not my choice of ale. |
And some not so nice views that remind us of bad times past.
Lizzie Jane and Quinquireme waiting patiently for Dreweat’s lock
(79) to empty.
It was quite smooth going although very breezy as we
approached Higgs lock (83) around midday.
Karl wanted to stop for a bite to eat so we pulled over
beneath the road bridge and did lunch, it was like a wind tunnel but we got
tied up ok and paused for half an hour.
Normally Karl opens the locks, I close them, but as I slowly
approached Guyer’s lock (84) behind Karl, I could see a boat on the landing,
that was odd as the only boat ahead of us should have cleared the lock bearing
in mind we had stopped just before, but then I noticed something did not look
right with the lock gates.
 |
| Mmmm... something looks wrong. |
The left hand gate was not looking very healthy!
 |
| Yep, that's not right! |
I brested alongside Karl and all became clear, a single
hander lady boater ascending the lock had got her bow wedged between the top of
the gate and the gate beam and lifted the gate from it’s retaining cup, she was
stuck and the gate was well out of place.
She was both embarrassed and a little shocked that this had
happened, and happened so quickly before she could prevent it, but Canal and River Trust had been called, attended briefly and gone away to get some
equipment, it had happened about 45 minutes before we arrived. They returned as we all waited and discussed
the issue, how easily it could happen, but shouldn’t happen, thank god it wasn’t
me, that sort of thing :-)
With a bit of muscle we freed the boat, they then jacked up the gate and with some persuasion got it back in to the cup and all was well, luckily no real damage done this time.
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| The boats free,now sort out the gate. |
 |
| Improving position. |
 |
| And with a quick clunk, it's back in the cup and good to go. |
This lock is ‘cursed’, it was the lock I broke my braces on when we came down this canal, it was then repaired by C&RT and then yesterday one of the beams snapped causing a long delays of three or four hours while repairs were carried out. I will avoid it in the future!
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| Not exactly joinery |
 |
| But as a temporary repair it'll do. |
So we then headed off to Newbury.
 |
| Approaching Newbury |
Through the mechanised pedestrian swing bridge.
And approaching
Newbury lock our favour of letting a boat go through the last lock first was
repaid, the boat moored on the straight section was them, and seeing us passing
the owner came out and locked us through, along with some children who we
encouraged to help, they love it.
We carried on through Newbury and moored practically where
we were on our downward journey. A good day, slightly longer than anticipated,
but some nice people met and some misfortune which all turned out for the good,
that’s narrow boat life!
Tonight’s mooring:
Totals today: 5.5 miles : 8 locks : 1 swing bridge
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