The weather man didnt do too well. It was supposed to be cooler but the wind should have gone down. He was only partly correct - it was much cooler and the wind was as strong as ever! We had just passed Wigrams Turn when we caught up with a slower boat in front. He in turn was following a motor and butty. These are the traditional working boats - the motor, 72ft of history fully laden with an aging 2 cylinder Bollinder engine towing a 'butty' - essentially another 72ft engineless hull. Pretty, but not fast.
Fortunately at Braunston they turned right down the Grand Union canal whilst we turned left onto the North Oxford. We arrived at the Hillmorton flight of threee double locks, the only locks of the day. Boaters were helped by at CaRT volunteer lockeeper which was great as they are busy locks.
We passed through Rugby - the first big population centre since Banbury - and the Newbold tunnel. This used to be brightly lit but we were disappointed to see that many of the coloured spotlights were not working. At last the wind dropped during the afternoon and we had a lovely journey entering into the midlands. Decided to moor up near the village of Brincklow before we got too close to the M6 which we can just hear in the distance.
Knocking the pins in, I noticed lots of bits of coal lying around on the side, presumably the result of a incident involving a coal carrying boat. Managed to scavenge enough to top up the fire.
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| The mornings queue. Not as stressful as the M25 however.... |
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| Who dat down dare? |
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| The not well-illuminated Newbold Tunnel |
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| Open-cast coal mining operations |
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